British Minister: Mugabe Trying to Steal Zimbabwe Election | Voice of America - English
A British government minister says if the upcoming election in Zimbabwe were free and fair, the opposition would win.  Mark Malloch Brown added that the world would not allow President Mugabe to get away with stealing the election.  Tendai Maphosa has more in this report for VOA from London.
Foreign Office Minister Mark Malloch Brown is thelatest to add his voice to the growing disapproval of President RobertMugabe's campaign for the presidential election set for June 27. Hespoke on local radio. "I suspect that from the fact that therewas a 55 percent anti-Mugabe vote in the first round, and everything hehas done since has only outraged and offended his own people and hisAfrican neighbors - that in that number's increase - say justmoderately by another 10 percent, that means that the opposition wouldhave two-to-one lead in the popular vote," he said. MallochBrown referred to the Zimbabwean government's stopping local electionofficers from deploying, limiting the number of internationalobservers, stopping the opposition advertising on state media andarresting opposition leaders as evidence Mr. Mugabe wants to steal theelection. "He obviously wants to steal it, but he is going tohave to do it so visibly and ostentatiously and outrageously I thinkthe world will, I hope, not let him get away with it," he added. Africanleaders, who had been reluctant to criticize Mr. Mugabe's governmentfor alleged human rights abuses, have begun openly expressing concernabout events in Zimbabwe. Reuters news agency quotes Tanzania ForeignMinister Bernard Membe as saying there is every sign the elections willnever be free or fair. The June 27 poll follows the result ofthe March election in which opposition Movement for Democratic Change(MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai won the most votes. But Zimbabweelection officials say he did not win the necessary majority to claimthe presidency. The MDC says more than 60 of its supportersand activists have been murdered by supporters of Mr. Mugabe's ZANU-PFparty, so-called war veterans of Zimbabwe's war of independence and thesecurity forces. A further 2,000, the opposition says, havereceived varying degrees of injuries, while 30,000 have beendisplaced. Mr. Mugabe blames the opposition for the violence,but reports by various human rights groups all say the president isusing violence to intimidate voters into backing him on June 27.