Zimbabwe: Elections, despondency and civil society's responsibility

Zanu PF swept to victory in the March 31 Zimbabwe elections,
consolidating the power of long-term president Robert Mugabe with a
two-thirds majority that will enable him to change the constitution.

The official results of Zimbabwe's March 31 parliamentary elections,
announced on 2 April, give the ruling Zimbabwe African National
Union-Patriotic Front (Zanu PF) 78 seats, the opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) 41 (down from 57 seats in 2000), and 1 to an
independent (Mugabe's notorious former information officer, Jonathan
Moyo). What happened? Why does it matter for progressives across Africa
and elsewhere?

What happened? Simply this: the urban poor and working-class were
cheated. The rural poor were intimidated into supporting a government
whose costs to them now far outweigh the limited benefits (for 130 000
households) of the ineffectual land redistribution strategy that began
in 2000. And the regional super-power collaborated to the full.

It's easy to substantiate this conclusion. Consider the past quarter
century of political repression meted out to opponents of Robert Mugabe
and his Zanu PF. During the 1980s, an initial round of strikes and land
invasions was suppressed by the new government; approximately 20,000
Matabeleland residents were killed in horrendous massacres; single
women were rounded up in urban raids; students were regularly beaten up
when they objected to declining living standards and corruption;
workers were targeted from the late 1980s when Mugabe lost control of
the trade unions; and the urban poor suffered police shootings during
mid/late-1990s IMF Riots.

Who was winning, then? Mainly Mugabe's cronies, several thousand
strong mini-class of high-ranking bureaucrats and business elites; but
most whites too, who until farm invasions began in earnest in February
2000, lived the high life. The 4000 commercial farmers controlling the
vast bulk of productive rain-fed land until 2000 benefited outlandishly
from 1990s economic liberalisation. Race and class inequality worsened.
World Bank and IMF policies - ably implemented by Zanu PF's ascendant
neoliberal technocrats - deindustrialised the economy and savaged
once-admirable social policies. Aspirants for 'indigenous bourgeois'
status jumped to the queue too, based on financial speculation and
military deals with the Democratic Republic of the Congo's Laurent
Kabila, fighting a war against rebels, Rwandans, and Ugandans.

Who was fighting back? Grassroots efforts for change reached a new
stage in February 1999 with the Working People's Convention, birthing
the MDC and producing a progressive manifesto. However, funding from
and alliances with white farmers and imperialists, including US state
agencies, led to moderation. Mugabe quickly labeled the MDC's leader
Morgan Tsvangirai, former head of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade
Unions, as "Tsvangison" the "boy" serving tea to the Blair/Bush global
regime.

In addition, the aftermath of a shocking February 2000 defeat of
Mugabe's constitutional referendum saw a revamping of Zanu-Pf's
electoral machinery. The parliamentary elections in June 2000 and March
2002's presidential contest were characterised by high levels of
violence and blatant thievery. Last week's parliamentary vote saw less
coercion, which necessitated more craftiness on the count..

How did they 'win' this time? A few days after the count, the MDC's
Eddie Cross reported that "A message passed on to Tsvangirai from a
state security agent said the MDC had in fact 'won' in 94 of the 120
seats." Whatever the genuine will of the people added up to, Mugabe
ensured it was suppressed. In Pretoria, his ally South African
president Thabo Mbeki ensured carefully censored 'observer teams'
declared the result 'the will of the people.'

Veteran Johannesburg liberal journalist, Alistair Sparks, summarises
the terrain quite accurately: "The playing field was skewed from the
beginning. The constitution enabled Mugabe to handpick 30 MPs, which
meant the opposition MDC needed 76 of the 120 contested seats to win a
majority of one while the ruling Zanu PF needed only 71 for a
two-thirds majority. Add to that the years of intimidation of
opposition voters, practically no access for the opposition to the
state-controlled media, the closure of the country's only independent
daily newspaper, the shutting out of foreign observers and
correspondents, the redrawing of constituency boundaries to eliminate
several safe MDC seats and make others marginal, a hopelessly outdated
voters roll which opened the way for nearly two million 'ghost' votes
to be cast, and you begin to get the picture. Ghost voters aside, more
than 133 000 living voters were turned away from the polls because of
the defective roll. But it was the count which proved decisive -
something which was also widely predicted but which the friendly
observer teams appear not to have observed."

Simply, Zanu-PF captured the vote processing procedure. Zimbabwean
analysts say the theft worked in 2000 and 2002 when Zanu PF counted
trucked-in ballots centrally. Results were faxed to Mugabe's home,
where they were altered and sent back. This time, things were more
difficult because counting was done at voting stations, from where the
numbers were sent to the constituency centres.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Support Network - a reputable NGO alliance with
observers in 6,000 of the approximately 8,000 polling stations -
pointed to the confusion late March 31. They were not certain whether
or not the results were to be posted immediately on the station doors.
Initially Zanu PF endorsed this approach. It changed tack later, so
they could be released in aggregate from the constituency centres.

Polling agents were forced to sign affidavits swearing secrecy to
station procedures. This indicates the importance of the ghost voters -
the MDC claims 2.7 million - appearing on a terribly inaccurate voter's
roll of 5.7 million. Says Cross, "These were manipulated and used to
pad out areas where Zanu PF felt they could dominate the election
campaign and control the electoral process. [Thus] the delimitation
exercise was gerrymandered to further tilt the electoral process
against the MDC."

The most visible manifestation of the theft was the Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission's sudden halt in their announcements of aggregate voters per
constituency on the night of March 31, so that the total votes cast
would not conflict so baldly with the altered numbers. In some cases
there was a smoking gun. In Manyame, a half-hour drive south-west of
Harare, Mugabe's nephew ran. The Commission announced that 14,812
people had voted in the constituency. The next day the total was
changed to 24,000, resulting in a 15,000 win for Zanu PF. There were
many similar incidents, amounting to at least 200,000 extra votes.

Under these circumstances, should the MDC have played the electoral
game? The party and civil society supporters knew the playing field was
badly skewed and that the vote counting would be monopolised by
Mugabe's agents (the shadowy Electoral Directorate - not even in the
Electoral Act - is completely controlled by the military).

Last August the MDC announced a 'suspension' of participation on
grounds that the minimum conditions set by the Southern African
Development Community (SADC), including freedom of association, access
to mass media, and a truly independent electoral commission, were not
implemented. Matters improved noticeably after the MDC's January
announcement that it would indeed participate. SADC guidelines were
flouted systematically, but not nearly as badly as in 2000 or 2002, or
subsequent parliamentary by-elections.

Some sources say Tsvangirai himself was not keen to participate, but
others in the MDC prevailed. Parliamentarians with no other income
wanted to stay in parliament, the trade unions wanted the MDC to
contest given the failure of both elite negotiations and intermittent
mass action strategies, and people in rural and urban Matabeleland saw
no sense in giving their MDC seats to the other tiny opposition
parties. Once Tsvangirai was cleared of a frame-up treason charge last
September, he toured Africa and Europe, and pressure was undoubtedly
applied there. Long-time Mugabe supporter Mbeki - who announced on
March 1 that this election would be free and fair - put heavy pressure
on Tsvangirai to participate.

Mbeki will continue suffering ridicule, especially as he tours the
world proclaiming that the New Partnership for Africa's Development
signals the continental elites' democratic commitment. Cross conceded,
"What was very disappointing was the appalling lack of integrity (or
simply stupidity) in the SA and the SADC observer missions. But we were
told by almost everyone before this whole farce began that we were
wasting our time and money - the election would be rigged (the Zanu PF
cannot get off the Tiger without being eaten hypothesis) and that the
African observer missions would whitewash the result. Our detractors
were spot on, but it was worth the effort."

Was it? Time will tell whether the post-election despondency across
much of Zimbabwe will lift. The immediate reaction of progressives we
talked to was extreme frustration. SMS messages on Harare's cellphones
advised people to 'defend their vote' A flying demonstration of 400 was
organised in the city centre, with most people dispersing as the police
arrived. MDC youth begged the leadership to foment protest, but more
conservative voices in the national executive prevailed over the
weekend. By mid-week, reports were emerging of Zanu PF's revenge
campaigns against known MDC voters especially in rural areas.

Will there result, now, an upsurge of urban protest against both
electoral and socio-economic grievances? In October 2000 a rise in
basic goods' prices ignited a fire. This time, many commodities -
including petrol and the staple food, maize - will likely become scarce
and prices will soar. The effective South African fuel price is two and
a half times as much as Zimbabwe's controlled price. As the Zimbabwe
dollar devalues, the last six months' artificially-constructed economic
revival based upon strategic state spending and lower interest rates
will quickly degenerate.

Nevertheless, Zanu PF leaders hope that the election will convince the
region to forget about Zimbabwe, that their two-thirds control of
parliament will allow constitutional changes and reinforce Mugabe's
rule perhaps until 2010, and that Mbeki will bring the World Bank and
IMF back to the party (Mugabe has been defaulting on loans since 1999
simply because Zimbabwe ran out of foreign currency for repayment).

According to a young Bulawayo socialist, Briggs Bomba: Zanu PF "is
doing everything to regain the confidence of international capital, and
to re-integrate with the 'international community'. Reserve Bank
Governor Gideon Gono is leading efforts to liberalise not just the
monetary system but the whole economy and to re-engage international
institutions like the IMF and the World Bank." The MDC has a faction
always open to elite deal-making with Mbeki, but is not likely to
persuade the masses.

If people in the cities can get evidence that rural people did not let
them down, contrary to popular urban wisdom, they may see some way out
of this. Mugabe's careful construction of a peasant/worker divide since
the late 1990s may come apart. Even land-invading war veterans who who
tried to get into Zanu PF during the party primaries, but were shunted
aside in favour of the political class, are as angry as the city folks.

Wilfred Mhanda, one of the most serious of war veterans and Mugabe
critics, founded the Zimbabwe Liberator's Platform. Knowing Mugabe
would not 'lose,' he advocated boycotting the election and using other
means of struggle. But even if winning was impossible, perhaps this
election fray allowed the MDC to at least unveil the most manipulative
political regime in a region full of venal state elites. Their
challenge is to prove this decisively to the rest of society.

The challenge for us living elsewhere, not suffering the daily
degradation associated with Mugabe's tyranny, is to offer solidarity.
Here, the prior months and weeks were partially encouraging. The
Congress of SA Trade Unions (COSATU) attempted several times to enter
Zimbabwe to strategise with the ZCTU. Several other activist groups
worked hard to raise consciousness, albeit under carefully controlled
conditions. The union, however, disappointed activists - especially in
the impressive community-labour Zimbabwe Social Forum - by pulling back
from pre-election threats to blockade the SA-Zimbabwe border, after
severe pressure from Mbeki and his officials.

And yet, a February 25 statement by South African civil society's
Zimbabwe Solidarity and Consultation Forum still sees a role for Mbeki:
"We say confidently that we have contributed to a much greater
understanding of the crisis and challenges in Zimbabwe within our
organizations and within the broader South African debate... We commend
efforts made by the South African government and by SADC to foster
talks between the major political forces in Zimbabwe to arrive at a
negotiated road-map for a democratic transition."

More militant South Africans reject such a role, based upon Mbeki's
appalling performance to date. Leftist activists in the
Anti-Privatisation Forum and Jubilee movement engaged in a joint
fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe in February, although colleagues from
the Landless People's Movement disputed criticisms of Mugabe's messy
land redistribution.

But the real solidarity action ahead may revolve around COSATU and
broader civil society forces. They must shake free of Mbeki's influence
and establish a strategy for longer-term support. This would more
forcefully and surgically target Mugabe and his cronies, and nurture
the unpredictable resurgence of Zimbabwean protests, which certainly
still lie ahead.