2008 Articles 25 Dec Kingdom Come 21 Dec Christmas 15 Dec Step Forward 5 Dec Beginning 1 Dec Amendment 30 Nov Facilitation 26 Nov Genocide 24 Nov Running Out 17 Nov Crisis 15 Nov Somalia 12 Nov What Next? 8 Nov Leadership 2 Nov Chipo 1 Nov Rome Burns 29 Oct Failure 25 Oct High Noon 19 Oct Never Easy 10 Oct Abyss 8 Oct Filibustering 4 Oct Chaos in Zim 29 Sept A Mule? 21 Sept On Step 16 Sept The End 12 Sept New Beginning 11 Sept Deal? 6 Sept Consequences 3 Sept Need a Deal 2 Sept Dollar Died 31 Aug Steering 29 Aug Unstuck 23 Aug Betrayed 18 Aug The Devil 13 Aug 13 Aug 08 12 Aug Today 11 Aug Cliffhanger 8 Aug Whats Going On 27 Jul Progress 22 Jul Agree to talk 21 Jul Mbeki kicks 16 Jul Crunch Time 13 Jul Economics 9 Jul Reality Looms 2 Jul Where? 30 Jun Looking Glass 26 Jun Battle 22 Jun What Now? 21 Jun The Commitment 16 Jun Do or Die 13 Jun Morning After 10 Jun Closing Doors 26 May Current Outlook 24 May Fan Club 19 May Tyranny 17 May End Game 15 May Flushing 8 May Violence 6 May Bizarre Process 25 Apr Cornered 20 Apr Electoral Fraud 19 Apr Jesse 17 Apr This Farce 11 Apr The Devil 6 Apr Wounded Buffalo 1 Apr Dying Kick 31 Mar Politcl Tsunami 27 Mar Current Situ. 26 Mar 4 days to go 21 Mar 8 days to go 15 Mar Election Time 27 Feb Games Begin 17 Feb Public Office 11 Feb Choices 4 Feb Decision Time 26 Jan Ambushed 25 Jan The Struggle 20 Jan Truth or Fiction 12 Jan Mugabe Mistake 8 Jan Surprise 2 Jan Kenya Lessons
Articles:- 2024 2023 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004-01
|
|
|
|
|
The Last Kicks of a Dying Horse
What a dramatic two days this has been. With voting over in the
allotted 12
hours, counting has taken another 72 hours and in some cases the
Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission is still verifying the vote results. In a dramatic
development the political masters in Zanu PF tried to force ZEC to
declare
Mugabe the winner with 53 per cent of the vote and a Zanu PF majority
of 115
seats.
This information was sent to us by elements in Zanu PF and we made the
plan
public at a press conference at 10.00 hrs today. But once again the ZEC
has
come up trumps - they refused to gerrymander the results and are
slowly
releasing the final results to the public. This appears to be an effort
to
give the Zanu PF people a chance to 'clean house' in advance of
what will be
a fairly rapid transfer of power once the final figures for the
Presidential
election are announced.
It would seem that the last minute desperate measures to frustrate a
MDC
victory was made late yesterday and last night but has faded by this
morning. The best indication of that is that the heavy police presence
evident last night has faded and there are no police or army units on
the
street today.
So at last it looks as if the ZEC will eventually announce that Morgan
Tsvangirai has won this election - I personally expect the final ZEC
tally
to be 58 per cent for Morgan Tsvangirai, 27 per cent for Mugabe and 15
per
cent for Simba Makoni. I also expect that the final tally in terms of
the
Parliamentary seats will be 115 for MDC, 12 for the Mutambara group, 8
independents and 75 for Zanu PF. It is clear that many of the Zanu PF
seats
were in fact rigged in their favor but ZEC is accepting this as it was
what
I call 'micro rigging' - in the sense that they manipulated the
numbers of
people voting.
There were many ways in which they could do this - threats against
the
population - 'vote Zanu PF or else', multiple voting in remote
areas where
there was insufficient supervision, the postal ballot and moving people
into
key constituencies. We will have to look at all of these and decide
which we
will take to court once the dust has settled.
But there can be no doubt this was a huge upset. Zanu seems to have
been
dislodged by a variety of factors. They gerrymandered the electoral
districts giving the rural vote (their traditional source of power) a 2
to 1
advantage over the urban voter. Then they gerrymandered the voter's
roll and
the distribution of polling stations. These measures were overcome by
two
essential elements - a very high turn out of the voters in urban
areas (30
per cent of the voters roll but probably 65 per cent of the actual
number of
registered voters that are still here) and a very low turn out in rural
districts (15 per cent or less). They also underestimated the Makoni
factor
and he did much better than expected.
This was a referendum on Mugabe's leadership and even with all the
rigging
and gerrymandering, he is now just so unpopular that he could not be
rescued. I doubt if he got 10 per cent of the vote, nationwide. What
we
have witnessed in the last 24 hours are the last kicks of a dying
dynasty. I
wonder what is going on right now behind those closed doors!
Eddie Cross
31st March 2008
|