HARARE, Zimbabwe, April 5, 2008
Zimbabweans Fear Mugabe's Fight For Power
Armed Guards Prevent Opposition From Entering High Court To Demand Release Of Election Results
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Photo
A youth sells mobile phone airtime as he sits next to electoral campaign posters in the center of Harare, April 5, 2008. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change party appealed for United Nations intervention Saturday to prevent bloodshed in a runoff campaign because it fears Mugabe will use brute force to try to retain power. (AP Photo/Mujahid Safodien)
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Zimbabwe History
Key dates in the history of the former British colony in southern Africa.
Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai has told a news conference that his party is reluctant to take part in an election runoff because of the growing risks of violence.
Earlier today, armed police prevented opposition lawyers from entering Zimbabwe's High Court to lodge an urgent suit aiming to force the publication of presidential election results.
Opposition lawyer Alec Muchadehama said a senior police officer wearing a ruling ZANU-PF shirt gave the orders, amid increasing signs of a clampdown.
"No one is going to enter. They say they are going to call the riot police," Muchadehama said. Journalists waiting outside the court also were ordered to disperse.
The Movement for Democratic Change wanted the High Court to force the electoral commission to publish results of the March 29 presidential election.
The opposition will mount a new bid in the High Court on Sunday for the election results to be published.
Official results for the parliamentary elections showed the ruling party lost its majority in the 110-seat parliament. Independent observers projected that MDC candidate Tsvangirai won most of the votes cast in the presidential contest but not enough for an outright victory over longtime ruler Robert Mugabe.
The ruling ZANU-PF party announced Friday it was endorsing Mugabe, whose 28-year rule led Zimbabwe from liberation to ruin, in a runoff election.
Earlier, the opposition asked the United Nations to intervene during the runoff campaign over fears that Mugabe, 84, may stage a violent crackdown to retain power.
London's Guardian newspaper reported that Mugabe's aides said he is prepared to give up power in return for immunity from prosecution for past crimes, but that if opposition leaders do not agree, then Mugabe may declare emergency rule.Nelson Chamisa, spokesman for the opposition, pointed to signs of a coming clampdown, including a march in Harare by war veterans loyal to Mugabe who have beat up opponents in the past, a raid on opposition party offices and the detention of foreign journalists by armed police in full riot gear.
"They are trying to intimidate people, they are trying to set up the context for unleashing violence. The vampire instincts of this regime are definitely going to come out," Chamisa charged.
Zimbabwe needs the assistance of the international community, he said.
"The U.N. has to make sure that there is no violence in this country. ... They should not (wait to) come when there is blood in the street, blood in the villages."
But South African President Thabo Mbeki said Saturday that international intervention is not needed.
"I think it is time to wait. Let's see the outcome of the election results. If there is a re-run of the presidential election let us see what comes out of that," Mbeki said.
Mugabe has ruled since his guerrilla army helped bring about an independent Zimbabwe in 1980. His popularity has been battered by an economic slide that followed the often-violent seizures of white-owned commercial farms since 2000. A third of the population has fled the country, 80 percent of those who remain are jobless and inflation is more than 100,000 percent.
Chamisa said he expected the court to answer its petition for the election results immediately in Saturday morning's hearing, but he was not hopeful of the outcome.
Zimbabwe's courts are stacked with Mugabe sympathizers who have delayed hearing opposition challenges to results of 2002 and 2005 elections that international observers said were marked by fraud and intimidation.
The U.S. and other Western nations also have been pressing for the presidential results to be announced.
The law requires a runoff within 21 days of the first elections. But diplomats in Harare and at the United Nations said Mugabe was planning to declare a 90-day delay to give security forces time to clamp down.
An African Union election observer team found no evidence of fraud during voting last weekend, according to the delegation's leader, former Sierra Leone president Ahmed Tejan Kabbah.
Kabbah praised Mugabe as "a patriot," and said during a meeting Thursday that the Zimbabwe leader was "relaxed" despite his setback at the polls.
New York Times journalist Barry Bearak was among those detained Thursday by heavily armed riot police who surrounded and entered a Harare hotel frequented by foreign reporters, lawyers said. The U.S.-based National Democratic Institute said one of its staff, American Dileepan Sivapathasundaram, was detained at Harare's airport as he tried to leave the country Thursday.
The government had rejected most foreign journalists' applications to cover the elections and had barred Western election observers.
Lawyer Beatrice Mtetwa said the attorney general decided there was no case against the two Americans and a third person who was not identified. However, police decided to hold them. It was not clear whether new charges would be filed.
State Department Tom Casey said four Americans were detained Thursday, but two had been released and were leaving the country. He told reporters Friday that U.S. officials had been in contact with the two Americans still in custody.
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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See all 51 CommentsBlow the *** up or shoot him.
"A third of the population has fled the country, 80% of those who remain are jobless and inflation is more than 100,000%."
Can you imagine living in a country like that?
We need more leaders like Mugabe to show the world that Africans%u2019 can lead a "harmonized." nation.
Correct me if I''m wrong. Most of the people who have left Zimbabwe are black not white.
So you have no problems with the way Mugabe has run Zimbabwe since he took over in 1980? The black population would not say he''s a "monster"? Everyone is happy with Mugabe? He has done a lot of good things for the people? He cares about their health, safety & welfare? Mugabe can''t sleep at night because he is so worried about the current state of Zimbabwe.
Enlighten me, oh wise one. Give me a list of his achievements.
I''m waiting, milesbrown49...
Posted by milesbrown49 at 04:23 PM : Apr 05, 2008
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"A third of the population has fled the country, 80% of those who remain are jobless and inflation is more than 100,000%."
Posted by bhoogren at 05:26 PM : Apr 05, 2008
Yeah, inflation''s got so bad that their planning to print a Gazillion Zimbabwean Dollar note!!!
Once South Africa get tired of the border incursions, black marketeering and outside pressure to speak up about conditions the people are suffering, revolt will ensue. Wonder if the Chinese agri-laborers the government hired to cultivate the fallow lands will be drafted and forced to resist hungry, angry citizens of Zimbabwe, drawing China into, finally, taking a position of moral subtance, now that Africa is in their sphere-of-influence. (maybe better than USSR and the West?)
He should have used Bush''s tactic, bribe, or threaten some key politicians, and re-interpret the law to declare himself immune to prosecution, and make ex post facto laws to clear past crimes by his cronies.
Then he should endorse a loyal puppet lap dog to replace him, then the US would have no right to comment.
I have yet to hear of a benevolent government being toppled by it''s own people.
If the "White" ruling class was doing good for the people if Zimbabwe, they would not have been ousted.
Same for Mugabe.
This has nothing to do with ethnicity.
WHO KILLED THOUSANDS OF WHITE FARMERS AND GAVE THEIR LAND TO BLACKS IN THE NAME OF CIVIL RIGHTS MAJORITY RULE!
Posted by bluestardad at 07:20 AM : Apr 06, 2008
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You are quite welcome! :)
Posted by SgtRDS at 08:49 PM : Apr 05, 2008
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Not even close!!! LMAO. You know very little about Idi Amin and the piles of bones he left behind. He and Pol Pot were spiritual brothers and make Mugabe look like Mother Teresa.
Yeah, inflation''''s got so bad that their planning to print a Gazillion Zimbabwean Dollar note!!!
Posted by bgwinnett at 08:10 PM : Apr 05, 2008
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Yup. That and a American quarter will get them a dime cup of coffee.
Na he''s just a crook.
Posted by bhoogren at 11:45 AM : Apr 06, 2008
Probably buy mansion in Harare and the Dollar''s no great shakes at the moment.
Posted by brianbwb at 09:02 AM : Apr 06, 2008
Not necessarily, Africans indulge in racism whether or not its good for them. African countries are the most genocidal, most racist places on earth, the entire culture is bound up in an ugly racial view of the world in which my tribe kills your tribe for no good reason, other than primal racial hatred and rivalry. Look at that sick freak Thabo Mbeke and how he supports Mugabe even as it hurts South Africa''s economy and brings ruin on South Africa - but his hatred of those who are of a different skin color or "tribe" in this case the whites makes him love and defend Mugabe no matter what he does.
This is the tradgedy of Africa, this inability to see past racism and petty hatreds. This is why they created slavery in those countries (though the Eurpopean colonists unfortunately allowed slavery to be exported to them) and why they are in poverty today. Because it turns out that diversity and tolerance are very good things, they lead to prosperity and general well-being.
We can only hope someday Africa and African people outgrow their narrow "racial" view of the world, and learn to tolerate, accept, and work with people of all different backgrounds.
Posted by bhoogren at 11:44 AM : Apr 06, 2008
I know quite a bit about Idi Amin, but you have forgotten that Mugabe is just getting started.
Gordon Brown however is too busy kindling the Olympic flame in London to care sh*t about the former colony.
France seems better adapted at keeping the peace in former colonies.
Trouble in Chad - and the Foreign Legion are activated.
It would help if the rest of the world could lose their "racial" view of Africa, seeing them only as slave labor, whose blood and land is to be exploited for the profit of the rest of the world, and to the detriment of the people.
De Beers is a prime example, diamonds from Africa have made them obscenely rich, but the people taking them from the ground remain very poor. Why is it that the high price paid for diamonds is only paid to a Eutopean?
Yeah I know, I ask for too much at this time.
Enlighten me, oh wise one. Give me a list of his achievements.
I''''m waiting, milesbrown49...
Mugabe took back the land stolen from the Africans and is in the mist of ridding the oppressive rule of the white majority. We all know it will be hard and tough times. Look at the great depression in America and how great it is today. No one blamed the president for it. Did you think that it would be easy to rid the country of the haunting of many years. The land was farmed by Africans before the colonist came and will be farmed after. The one last thing Mugabe must do is to rid Zimbabwe of all of the colonist as they are causing problems and interupting the healing of the Africans. Go back to Europe for gods sake!!!
If Africans farmed the land before the colonist came, why are the farms not producing any crops after twenty years? And if Africa has so much rich resources, why are we sending money for AIDS to them?
None of the "Africans" on this forum care that these are still stolen lands, so long as it''s stolen from white people.
The minute that you bring up that the farms that were once productive are now unproductive, all you get is a chorus of "we need more time, help us help us", and other annoying excuses.Mugabe and his henchmen should have thought of that before the re distribution, but it''s easier to blame whitey, right?
I also love the fact that neither this channel, nor CNN bother to run the story that happened on Sunday, where Mugabes people "took back" (as if it were ever theirs in the first place) more white owned farms.
Look for a)more African blood to be spilled folowed by another round of b) starvation.
No. Starvation is unacceptable.
"We are not hungry... Why foist this food upon us? We don''t want to be choked. We have enough."
"Our votes must go together with our guns. After all, any vote we shall have, shall have been the product of the gun. The gun which produces the vote should remain its security officer - its guarantor. The people''s votes and the people''s guns are always inseparable twins."
"It may be necessary to use methods other than constitutional ones."
"The only white man you can trust is a dead white man."
"I wish to assure you that there can never be any return to the state of armed conflict which existed before our commitment to peace and the democratic process of election under the Lancaster House agreement."
In concluding this agreement and signing this report the parties undertook:
to accept the authority of the Governor;
to abide by the Independence Constitution;
to comply with the pre-independence arrangements;
to abide by the cease-fire agreement;
to campaign peacefully and without intimidation;
to renounce the use of force for political ends;
to accept the outcome of the elections and instruct any forces under their authority to do the same.
Under the Independence Constitution, 20% of seats in the country''s parliament were reserved for whites.
The whites are only less than 10% of the population, in America blacks are near 15% of the population, lets reserve 30% of the Senate seats for them!!
The white people of Zimbabwe are arogant idiots. They deserve complete exile. Go back to Europe!!!!
And you are where? Go on back to Africa you and Charles Taylor, Joshua Blahyi should have alot in common.
I''m sure the Zulu killed more people then the whites ever thought of.
Kind of see Darwin at work here? The whites were always out numbered.
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