Mugabe Will Take Part in Run-off, Party Officials Say

Officials from Zimbabwe's ruling Zanu-PF party today said the president, Robert Mugabe, would run in the second round of the country's presidential election.

The news came after Zimbabwe's electoral commission finally confirmed the results of the poll, which was held five weeks ago.

Commission officials said Mugabe lost the election but that his opponent, Morgan Tsvangirai,had gained less than the 50% of the vote required to avoid a run-off ballot.

The figures - giving Tsvangirai 47.9% to 43.2% for Mugabe, Zimbabwe's leader since independence in 1980 – were close to those leaked by Zanu-PF earlier in the week.

However, a formal declaration of the results remains some days away because the count has still to be approved by the contenders.

Tsvangirai said his Movement for Democratic Change's tally gave him 50.3% - enough for an outright win - and that he would not participate in a second round.

Tendai Biti, the MDC secretary general, today told the Guardian the party would not shift from that position, even if it allowed Mugabe to declare himself president again by default.

"If he thinks he can be president when he lost, or by having a run-off election all on his own, who will give him legitimacy? They think we will play ball, but they are wrong," he said in Johannesburg.

"Sooner rather than later, we will form a government."

The British foreign secretary, David Miliband, said Mugabe had 'clearly lost' the election.

Miliband urged him to call an immediate halt to the campaign of violence and intimidation which the MDC said had been unleashed against its supporters following the poll five weeks ago.

He said any second round of voting must be 'free, fair and open to international monitors".

Zimbabwe's government is threatening to jail Biti if he returns to Zimbabwe, alleging that he has incited violence and "illegally" published election results.

The threat appeared to be designed to further undermine the opposition in the event of a second round of voting.

The state-run Herald newspaper said Zimbabwe's police chief, General Augustine Chihuri - who recently said he would never allow the opposition to come to power - had written to Biti, accusing him of contravening election laws by announcing the MDC's own collation of polling station returns and declaring Tsvangirai the winner.

"You know for sure your violation of the country's laws by declaring presidential results ... is still to be attended to by the police," he wrote in the letter.

The police chief also accused the MDC secretary general of being responsible for the violence sweeping rural areas. Hundreds of people have been seriously injured and around 20 killed.

The accusation came despite victims and human rights groups saying it had been orchestrated by the state against opposition supporters.

"What is very conspicuous in the Zimbabwean political arena today is your prominent role in urging and abetting political violence through unbridled rhetoric of incitement," Chihuri wrote.

Biti said he had not received the letter, but that there is no such crime as releasing election results - particularly when he was merely publicizing the counts posted at each polling station for anyone to read.

The accusations appear to be aimed at further deterring Biti and other opposition leaders from returning home.

"I really want to go back, but the problem is I have no illusion about the capacity of those people to do evil," he said.

"What I'm weighing is the issue of going back and going to prison or staying outside and coordinating the opposition campaign," he said. "I'm really caught in a predicament."

Tsvangirai has also remained abroad for the past month, in part to lobby governments in the region but also because of fears for his safety.