<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/31/international/africa/31zimbabwe.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print&position=>
The New York Times March 31, 2005 Zimbabweans Campaign in Shadow of Mugabe's Fist By MICHAEL WINES ULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, March 30 - With Zimbabweans set to vote in crucial parliamentary elections on Thursday, President Robert G. Mugabe's opponents have appeared to be riding a wave of popular support that could carry them from near oblivion to a stunning comeback. But as the opposition made final election day plans on Wednesday, there were hints that Mr. Mugabe's party would not allow that. In the Bulawayo office of David Coltart, a member of Parliament and of the opposition party Movement for Democratic Change, party members telephoned from around the nation to complain that government-appointed election officers were barring the party's voting monitors from polling places, claiming they had no proof of their identities. Although the law does not require it, the officials were demanding that the party's monitors produce copies of a newspaper advertisement in which the names of poll monitors are published. In rural areas, where communications are often slow or nonexistent, this could be impossible. "There's definitely a pattern that has emerged today of trying to deny our agents access to the polling places," Mr. Coltart said. "And if this is happening in urban areas, imagine what's happening in rural areas." His complaint appeared to bolster what democracy advocates and opposition party members have charged for some time: that this election, a possible turning point in Mr. Mugabe's 25-year rule, is rigged to favor those in power. The true test will come when the votes of millions are cast and counted under new election laws that critics say have been baldly rigged against the opposition, using voting rolls that critics say are both padded and wildly unreliable. Mr. Mugabe's aides deny even the hint of irregularity. "This is a country free to campaign," said Eliot Manyika, the political director of the president's party, the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front, or ZANU-PF, and a veteran of the government intelligence service. "We have the people's support." The stakes are huge, the risks high. For the opposition, a strong showing might allow it to challenge Mr. Mugabe's legitimacy as president and demand a share of power in the government. A drubbing that appears rigged could bring anti-Mugabe protesters into the streets for the first time. Mr. Mugabe's party needs a convincing victory not just to keep a grip on Parliament, but also to start the delicate process of succeeding Mr. Mugabe, now 81. His term ends in 2008, but a bitter struggle over a successor has already broken out between his tribal allies within ZANU-PF, who control much of the nation's economic and political machinery, and party officials from other tribes who have been sidelined. Many in the party hope to arrange Mr. Mugabe's early retirement and an orderly transition to one of their own before any 2008 ballot. But that requires changing the Constitution - and that, in turn, requires a two-thirds majority in the 150-seat Parliament, which ZANU-PF now lacks. Mr. Mugabe has repeatedly predicted that ZANU-PF would win two-thirds of Parliament. That would require it to claim a handful of seats from the Movement for Democratic Change, which now clings to 51 seats. To place a stamp of legitimacy on the election, Mr. Mugabe has invited hundreds of foreign observers, mostly from friendly nations like Russia, South Africa and China. He has also agreed to follow fair-election guidelines laid down by the Southern African Development Community, 14 nations mostly friendly to Mr. Mugabe. But those rules have been haphazardly followed, and the group's election monitors were let into Zimbabwe only belatedly. Independent election monitors and international agencies contend - and the government denies - that food has been widely used as a political weapon. In a nation beset by chronic shortages, residents are routinely denied the right to buy corn unless they produce a ZANU-PF party card. Yet to foreign journalists, also unexpectedly admitted to report on the election, Mr. Mugabe's forecast of a sweeping victory has often seemed to be a pipe dream. The five-year-old opposition party M.D.C. lost more than 300 members to violence in the last two elections, which were widely condemned as fraudulent. The party had vowed to sit out this election unless Mr. Mugabe followed basic rules for fair voting but relented under outside pressure - and has been stunned by the results. Mr. Mugabe's government, intent on convincing foreign governments that its rule is legitimate, has permitted relatively open campaigning in the last two months, and violence has dropped dramatically. Perhaps because of that, M.D.C. candidates have found a gusher of popular support, attracting large and frenetic crowds even in areas where its members once were banned. In the capital, Harare, an M.D.C. stronghold, up to 25,000 cheering supporters jammed a field on Sunday to hear the party's president, Morgan Tsvangirai, call for a wholesale change in Zimbabwe's government. By contrast, Mr. Mugabe's party has looked moribund, drawing scant crowds and often packing campaign sites with bused-in audiences. At a listless rally on Monday in rural Chivhu, a town of 30,000 that has been a center of ZANU-PF support, barely 3,000 people showed up, a quarter of them schoolchildren. Mr. Mugabe's harangue against his opponents and Prime Minster Tony Blair of Britain - whose supposed plan to reclaim Zimbabwe as a colony is the center of the party's campaign - drew just seconds of polite applause. Still, Mr. Mugabe has seemed almost serene. While opposition party leaders barnstormed over the weekend, drawing tens of thousands, the president took a three-day vacation. When a journalist for The Economist asked after the soporific Chivhu rally whether he could govern with a dominant M.D.C. faction, Mr. Mugabe did not miss a beat. "It will never happen," he said. Copyright 2 -- ----------------- R. A. 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