Opposition Party in Zimbabwe Accuses Mugabe of Printing Millions of Extra Ballots

HARARE, Zimbabwe: Mar. 24th. (Associated Press) — Zimbabwe’s main opposition party accused the government on Sunday of printing more than three million excess paper ballots for the coming presidential election and accused the country’s longtime leader, Robert Mugabe, of trying to rig the vote. Tendai Biti, secretary general of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, said leaked documents from government printers showed that nine million ballot papers were ordered for the 5.9 million registered voters in the presidential election on March 29. Legislative elections are scheduled to take place the same day. Correspondence supplied by Fidelity Printers, producers of the nation’s banknotes, also showed that 600,000 mail-in ballots were ordered for a few thousand soldiers, police officers and civil servants who were expected to be away from their home districts and for diplomats and their families abroad, Mr. Biti said. “We are extremely worried about the extra ballot papers,” he said. The chairman of the electoral commission, Judge George Chiweshe, refused to comment about the specific accusations, but he told reporters that his duty was to ensure free and fair elections.

The opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, said he expected Mr. Mugabe to “engage in every trick in the book” to rig the vote. At a campaign rally in the western part of Harare, the capital, a crowd of at least 30,000 people gathered in an open field to hear Mr. Tsvangirai. It was the largest crowd yet for an election rally. Only about 3,000 people, many of them bused in from rural areas, turned out to hear Mr. Mugabe in the country’s second largest city, Bulawayo. Mr. Mugabe, 84, a former guerrilla fighter who has led the nation since independence in 1980, vowed to stay in power. “Tsvangirai will never, never rule this country,” he told the crowd. “Those who want to vote for him can do so, but those votes will be wasted votes.” Mr. Mugabe also said that Zimbabwe would carry out a new law requiring all foreign- and white-owned companies to give 51 percent control of their operations to black people. “We want to see Zimbabwean people in control,” he said. “Our people must run the businesses. They should not just listen to white bosses.” In a carnival atmosphere that contrasted with Mr. Mugabe’s austere meetings, Mr. Tsvangirai, 55, said Mr. Mugabe was “really mad” over recent opposition gains ahead of the election. A few uniformed police officers watched the field. Many supporters, singing and wearing Tsvangirai T-shirts, arrived on antiquated trucks and vans belching exhaust smoke.

In past elections, Mr. Mugabe’s opponents have been prevented from openly wearing campaign T-shirts and distributing posters, fliers and other campaign materials. Mr. Tsvangirai and the other presidential candidate, former Finance Minister Simba Makoni, say they are gaining considerable support as a result of anger over a record inflation rate of 100,000 percent and widespread shortages of basic supplies. The opposition protested a last-minute change to voting procedures that would give police officers a supervisory role at polling places, saying it would intimidate voters. Western observers are barred, and Zimbabwe has invited only delegates from countries it considers friendly.
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