Gloating Mugabe Vows to Rule Until He is 100

Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe emerged strengthened and typically combative at the weekend after the overwhelming, but disputed, victory of his Zanu-PF party in parliamentary elections.

Mr Mugabe, 81, and in power for 25 years, vowed on Saturday that he would rule until he was 100. Asked when he planned to retire, he laughed: "When I am a century old."

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) claimed fraud and intimidation, and called for fresh elections under a new constitution yesterday. It claimed in a statement that it had won 94 seats, rather than the 41 announced by the electoral commission, but did not say how it reached that figure and officials did not elaborate.

The MDC ignored calls from civic leaders to lead mass demonstrations against Mr Mugabe. Instead, opposition leaders said they would call a one-day national strike to protest the result.

Final results announced yesterday by the electoral commission saw Zanu-PF take 78 seats of the 120 up for grabs in the election. The sacked former information minister, Jonathan Moyo, was the only independent to claim a seat.

With the 30 seats that President Mugabe appoints, Zanu-PF will have more than the two-thirds majority of the 150-seat house needed to make constitutional changes.

The mood was dejected in Harare and Bulawayo, cities which had voted overwhelmingly for the opposition. "At the hairdressers today there was none of the usual chattering or joking, everybody was depressed," said one Harare worker, Idah Mandaza.

"They said we face tough times ahead. Today there was no sugar in the shops. We are facing shortages on everything."

South Africa and other African observer missions endorsed the elections. They said the decreased violence, compared with parliamentary and presidential elections in 2000 and 2002, showed that Zimbabwe had made political progress.

Zimbabwe was congratulated on "peaceful, transparent, credible and well managed elections, which reflect the will of the people" by observers from the 14-state Southern African Development Community (SADC).

More than 10% of voters were turned away at the polls, according to the independent Zimbabwe Election Support Network, which deployed thousands of observers across the country. It noted huge discrepancies between the number of people recorded to have cast ballots and the final vote tallies in many districts - particularly in the government's rural strongholds.

The group's chairman, Reginald Matchaba-Hove, yesterday urged electoral officials to "seriously look into these discrepancies as a matter of extraordinary urgency, as this has serious implications on the credibility of the electoral officials".

Lovemore Madhuku, chairman of the civic group National Constitutional Assembly, said Mr Mugabe had been boosted by the election results and the support from African neighbours. "We expect more arrogance from him, especially in changing the constitution to permanently consolidate the power of Zanu-PF," said Mr Madhuku.

He also reproached the MDC's leaders for not having a plan ready to respond to their election defeat. "They should have expected it. This is their third defeat in fraudulent elections. Their supporters are disillusioned at their confusion," he said. He criticised the MDC for not mobilising for mass action against the regime.

John Makumbe, a lecturer in political science at the University of Zimbabwe, said Mr Mugabe's remark about ruling until he is 100 was not a joke. "He does not plan to retire; he intends to stay in power."

Mr Makumbe predicted that Mr Mugabe would soon sign into law a bill already passed by parliament that will give his government the power to close any private civic organisation, human rights group or charity.

"The non-government organisations will be his next target. He can't stand them because they expose his abuses. He will make them functionaries of the state or he will wipe them out," said Mr Makumbe.

Two Sunday Telegraph employees remained in jail yesterday after their arrest on Thursday for working as journalists without accreditation.

Officials said the two would appear in court today. A lawyer, Beatrice Mtetwa, said they should have appeared in court within 48 hours. Under Zimbabwe's media laws, the two could face up to two years in jail for working without a government-issued permit.