Thank you to all our fellow countrymen who turned out in their numbers to vote in South Africa and London. Soon we will be reunited.

Share This

First hand information has just come in from Bubi Umguza Constituency in Northern Matabeleland. Jacob Thabani, the MDC candidate is pitched against zanupf’s infamous Obert Mpofu.

Early this afternoon, a polling station was visited by a zanupf supporter with a bundle of ballots which he proclaimed were postal ballots. Postal ballots were meant to have been submitted prior to the start of the regular vote. He walked in and started to record the ballots in the Polling Station book when the MDC Election Agent stood his ground and refused to sign the book. The Zimbabwe Election Commission agent acted in accordance with his responsibility and contacted a member of the Constituency support group.

Support arrived at the station with experienced individuals and the Presiding Officer was informed that should he accept the postal ballots they would ensure the results from the polling station would be disqualified in the final constituency count.

In other districts in this area voters have been told to stay at home unless they have ZANU PF cards, as they will have to produce those before they can vote.

Obert Mpofu was also reported to have moved a polling station to his home about 10 kms away, but after pressure from voters he was forced to move it back.

This constituency serves 54 000 voters with a total of 104 polling stations. This incident is surely the tip of the iceberg.

Share This

In Kwekwe, there are reports that the MDC MP Mr Chebundo has discovered that zanupf were insisting that youths who are not registered join the queues after the closure of polling stations at 7pm and that they be allowed to vote. Apparently the situation is very tense and police fear they may lose control.

In Shangani constituency in Matabeleland North two zanupf vehicles arrived after polling closed and an unknown numbers of persons entered the polling station. The counting is continuing with these persons having remained inside the polling station.

At Victoria Falls Primary school a ballot box has been taken into the polling station purportedly containing 99 postal votes. The agents queried this activity and were told to mind their own business. Apparently 15 police officers were installed at this polling station prior to the count.

Share This

We can confirm that in Bulawayo the ballot boxes are still sealed and presiding officers are waiting for instruction to count. The Electoral Law states that counting must start within three hours of the polling station closing. We have less than half an hour to go. Let’s see if zanupf can meet this SADC Electoral Standard.

Share This

My thoughts are with everyone in Zimbabwe today, but especially with Roy Bennett, who has spent yet another day in a filthy prison cell in Mutoko. In the last parliamentary elections Roy stood as an MP for the Chimanimani constituency and he won a resounding victory in what was previously a zanu stronghold. The fact that he was a completely ord
inary white farmer, supported by a rural black majority, annoyed the zanu government beyond belief. How dare someone they’d branded as a ‘traitor’ be so popular among a population group they’d described as ‘land hungry and fed up with farmers’? Roy’s popularity and decency exploded the myth they tried to create.

I wonder if Roy could ever have imagined in those heady days of victory what he, his family and his constituents would endure at the hands of a vengeful, violent and vicious zanupf government in the four years that would follow? Could he have ever imagined that he’d be spending the next election day in a filthy jail cell - incarcerated outside a court of law - for a trivial ‘crime’?

Today must be so hard for him: the painful memories, the horrendous injustice, being isolated from the country on a day like this, and he must be torn with anxiety over not knowing how Heather, his wife, is faring in her fight to stand in his place today and make sure that the will of the people is preserved in Chimanimani.

It takes an extraordinary person to stand up to Mugabe and his government of thugs. Roy has done so time and time again. And the people of Chimanimani have stood alongside him through it all. We and the world need to step forward and protect our heros when they are hunted and hurt. Because without people as extraordinary as Roy, the rest of us don’t stand a chance; neither does democracy. Roy and Heather Bennett’s story is a profound example of what fighting for justice and freedom is really all about.

The world is watching today. We know in Zimbabwe that when the buzz is over the world’s attention drifts very quickly onto new stories in different parts of the world, and that we are suddenly in the dark and forgotten all over again. If the unthinkable (predictable) happens, and zanu steals yet another election from the people, please don’t shrug your shoulders and move on. Please don’t forget about Roy. Please read his story and join us in the fight for his freedom.

*Sokwanele: We have added a link to the Free Roy Bennett Campaign website in the margin links

Share This

I got up bright and early this morning, met up with other family members and off we went to vote! We queued happily at our chosen polling station. It opened 25 minutes late – not a good start! There was a lot of grumbling from the small gathering but everyone was patient and eventually the lines started moving. The very young policemen that was manning the door, did his bit in between checking his cell phone messages. Finally, it was my turn! Damn and blast! I was told that I am no longer on that voters roll so must have been moved into a different constituency.

Back in the car and off down the road to a polling station in the next door suburb. The feeling there is very different there. The queue is longer (not surprisingly as it is now nearly an hour later). The friendly policemen greets us and assists us with instructions on which line to join. There is general chit-chat and thank goodness, shade from the African sun! A while later, I leave – pink finger and all!

Now we wait. My friends have been phoning continuously. Some have reports of low turnout while others are still in queues. I wonder if the SA Election Observer could pass on the name of the nail specialist. I am going to need it after today!!

Share This

My pinky is cerise pink, I voted at 7.35am. The
police officer at our polling station was smiling and helpful. I was pleased to see the election officers jumping around and phoning other stations to try and find out if people whose names weren’t on the voters’ roll for that constituency, were perhaps registered in another constituency. I see these government workers itching to do the right thing. I just hope the situation remains calm in the rural areas, although I fear the rigging is at full swing there.

Selina phoned me this morning from the bottle store in her village. She said that many of the MDC polling agents had been sent back to town, she didn’t know why. She also said that there has been some intimidation from war vets. She is going to try and come home today if she can get transport and I will update you with her stories.

She’s in for such a surprise, because we’ve got a visitor! Selina’s son arrived at the house an hour ago. She doesn’t even know he’s in the country. He left for South Africa two years ago to help his family keep body and soul together. He came back yesterday, ESPECIALLY TO VOTE!!!

I am so proud of him. He hates Johannesburg, living in a gangster ridden neighbourhood and he wants to stay at home. I hope he will be able to, we need committed young guys to be here at home to rebuild our poor country.

Share This

By 1pm today it was confirmed that 16 000 people had cast their votes in Gwanda Constituency.

Go Gwanda Go!

Share This

The vote is actually under way now, and therefore imagine my surprise when I received a phone call a few minutes ago from none other than Joshua Malinga the ZANU-PF candidate for Bulawayo East constituency. I hasten to add that I don’t know the gentleman personally. What, I asked myself, could the candidate want to speak to me about ? A wrong number perhaps ? But no, Mr Malinga just wanted to ask me to go out and vote for him. I ask you ! He must have got my number from the telephone directory.

Never mind that it’s illegal for the candidates to campaign on the day – how desperate must Mr Malinga, and ZANU-PF, be to organize a phone around.

I paused, laughed and said “you must be joking !”

My vote for the MDC’s Welshman Ncube.

Share This

Reports reaching us from a number of activists in different locations around the country indicate that, contrary to the electoral ground rules set down by zanu-pf, presiding officers are now being instructed not to publish the results of poll immediately following the completion of the vote count at each polling station. Instead presiding officers are now under instructions to convey the results to the constituency centers and to await authorization from the Harare command center before releasing the results to the public.

Our informant in Binga reports that presiding officers in that constituency have been ordered to lock the polling stations at the close of polling and withdraw all means of communication from agents to ensure that nothing is communicated. This means that the results will not be published at the polling stations when the vote has been completed. The presiding officers are under instructions not to communicate any information about the poll until the consolidated result for the whole constituency has been verified and announced centrally. This is a major departure from the electoral procedures l
aid down by law.

This information has been confirmed for us by an undercover source in the Hwange East constituency.

Once again zanu-pf are moving the goal posts – this time while the game is in progress.

Share This

My daughter said I need to tell people about what happened to me yesterday. I went to get my nails done at the Meikles’ beauty salon where I struck up a conversation with a charming South African woman. Finally I asked her why she was in Zimbabwe and she said she was an election observer. I was most surprised as she was booked in for nail sculpting which takes at least two hours. I thought they were supposed to be out assessing the situation.

Share This

Went for a walk last Friday. It was long overdue – not because I need exercise, but because I needed to kickstart my self-respect again. I’ve worked with the Opposition in Zim over the past five years, but as Mugabe’s law-mongers have hacked away at anything that looks like a human right, I’ve tended to go further underground. The fresh air was wonderful! I was proud to walk alongside His Grace, Archbishop Pius Ncube as he lead the way around the streets of Bulawayo – God and our rights to the fore! Thank you Your Grace for showing me the light again! Watch out Bob – I’m on a roll again!

Share This

OBSERVER TEAMS 2005 ELECTION
Name of Observer Team Contact Person Contact Number/s

• SADC: +263 91 244 593
• ANC: +27 82 855 3249

MDC COMMAND CENTRE LINES
These lines are open to supporters to obtain information and make reports. Report any challenges you may encounter, which will be attended immediately on our hotlines, which are available 24 hours a day:

• Harare:(+263 4) 793259, 793260, 781139, 773142, 793250
• Bulawayo: (+263 9) 75233, 884080

Please PRINT THIS OUT NOW and put next to your telephone, and distribute by whatever means to as many people as you can. Thank you – MDC

CRISIS IN ZIMBABWE COALITION ELECTION INFORMATION CENTRE
The Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition Election information centre (24/7 – open until 4 April 2005)
091 288 605
091 907 235;
011 612 860;
011 603 439;
011 755 600;
091 956 570;
091 266 430;
011 862 269;
011 862 804 or
Harare (04) 793263

Share This

This Zim government will do anything to hold together their patchwork of lies and deceit! I was just speaking to someone who works for a large Bulawayo transport company. He said that on Thursday last week (24th March) the fuel companies were issued with a Ministerial directive to stop fuel supplies to all transport companies and other large consumers. Instead they were to supply to filling stations in and around Bulawayo until the elections were over! Well, its’s election day, and there still isn’t fuel readily available from the fi
lling stations. Doesn’t that tell you all? What desperate manipulation! What a direct admission of failure of the zanupf regime!

Share This

Our domestic worker (whom we fondly call Gogo – “granny” in Ndebele) came in this morning – laughing her head off. She has just come back from an Easter break with her family in Nkayi. Her first anecdote was from a zanupf rally held near her rural home.

The speaker had thundered away at the crowd for some time, then shouted “What has MDC done for you over the past five years?”. One very brave soul got up and retorted “What has zanupf done for us over the past TWENTY-FIVE years?”, at which the crowd collapsed into laughter, and started to drift away.

She also told us that she had got into commuter bus together with a staunch woman zanupf supporter. She lives quite close to us, and every now and then they hold wild noisy parties. That day, however, she was fuming and very unhappy indeed. She had a whole pile of zanupf T-shirts which she was finding impossible to give away – the people only wanted MDC T-shirts!

Share This