Early Zimbabwe election results

11.00am: We had intended to bring you two sets of results for each constituency – alongside the official results provided by the partisan Registrar-General Tobias Mudede, setting down the best count available from the polling stations themselves. In order to do this we were relying upon ZANU-PF to adhere to the electoral law of the land. This includes a provision (under the Electoral Act section 64 (2)) requiring the presiding officer of each polling station to affix a copy of the polling station return outside the polling station immediately upon the completion of the count.

Our mistake was to believe for one moment that this lawless regime would adhere to the law – even their own deeply flawed legislation. In fact we have now learnt that presiding officers were instructed to openly flout the law by imposing a news black-out on the results until authorised to release them by Harare. In the result at this stage we can only provide the official, and clearly suspect, results announced by the Registrar-General (column (2) on our tables). The blank column therefore indicates the missing element - the rule of law in Zimbabwe.

Despite every obstacle thrown in the way, we still intend to bring you the real results (column (1) on our tables) as soon as we are able.

Reports of the lawless activities of presiding officers and other officials of the Zimbabwe Election Officer (ZEC) continue to flood in. Here are just a sample few of them.

In one instance ZANU PF thugs entered the polling station after polling had closed and remained there while the counting continued (Insiza). In another, ballot boxes containing postal votes of unknown origin were added to the registered votes and when election agents queried this with the presiding officer they were told to mind their own business (Victoria Falls). In Kwe Kwe ZANU PF youths whose names were not on the register and who only arrived at the poling station after 7.00 pm, were allowed to vote despite the protests of election agents. At two polling stations in Lupane ZANU PF militia chased away the election agents, and the count continued in the absence of any MDC representatives. At another polling station photocopies of postal ballots of unknown origin were accepted, each and every one of them being votes for ZANU PF.

But the most blatant and widespread violation of the electoral law concerned the refusal of presiding officers to post the results at the polling stations upon the completion of the count, as required by Section 64 (2) of the Electoral Act. Time and again, and from centres across the country, we hear of polling officers refusing to post the results, and instead seeking to impose an illegal news blackout. MDC election agents were illegally detained at polling stations after the completion of the count, and they were prevented from using their cell phones. Many were imprisoned by presiding officers. In one instance (in Bulawayo East) the election agents only recovered their freedom by making good their escape from their captor (presiding officer). In many instances the MDC election agents are still being held hostage as we write.

It is clear that the many presiding officers who indulged in these criminal activities were acting on instructions from their superiors.

So much for a “free and fair” election in Zimbabwe.

Will President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa please take note.

* Sokwanele released a Special Mauritius Watch Summary Report on the eve of elections before they started. Please read this, and our archive of Mauritius Watch features maintained for 22 weeks prior to the elections, for a full picture of ZANU-PF's compliance - or lack of compliance - with the SADC Principles governing democratic elections.