U.S. says Mugabe lost election
PRETORIA —
The United States called time on Robert Mugabe’s 28 years as leader of Zimbabwe on Thursday, saying he had clearly lost an election last month and his opponent should now head a new government.
After talks with officials in neighboring South Africa, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Jendayi Frazer said the people of Zimbabwe had voted for a change on March 29 even though results have still to be announced.
“According to what we know, Morgan Tsvangirai won in the first round and there should be a change,” Frazer told reporters in Pretoria, citing results given by the independent Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN).
“The most credible results we have today are a clear victory for Morgan Tsvangirai in the first round and maybe a total victory,” said Frazer.
Frazer suggested that there should be no second round in the presidential vote, saying: “We feel that the political space in Zimbabwe has closed and so that would make it very difficult for any notion of a run-off.”
Asked about the political future for 84-year-old Mugabe, a former guerrilla leader, Frazer said: “Normally when you contest for president, you’re finished if you lose. That’s how democracies work.”
Independent data shows Tsvangirai beating Mugabe but failing to win an outright victory. Tsvangirai says he won more than 50% of the vote, but Mugabe’s supporters have said a second round is inevitable.
Frazer also responded coolly to the idea of a national unity government to end the political deadlock between Mugabe’s ruling party and the opposition, saying there was no way the president should stay in office.
“You don’t need a government of national unity, you simply have to respect the result of the election,” she said.
“There may need to be a political solution, a negotiated solution…. but any government should be led by Morgan Tsvangirai.”
While the United States has heavily criticized the delay in releasing the results of the polls, Frazer’s comments mark the first time the Bush administration has declared that Tsvangirai was the winner.
While Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party was initially declared the winner of simultaneous parliamentary elections, that result is also now up in the air as officials stage a partial recount.
Frazer was to meet Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and Zambian President Levy Patrick Mwanawasa, head of the Southern African Development Community, a key regional group, to up the pressure on Zimbabwe.
Frazer also said that Washington was “increasingly concerned about the violence and human rights abuses taking place in Zimbabwe after the elections.”
“This has created a climate of intimidation and violence…. We can’t stand back and wait for this to escalate further.”
Speaking alongside Frazer, U.S. Ambassador to Zimbabwe James McGee said hospitals were overflowing with victims of state-sponsored violence and said there was a growing number of refugees in the country.
“The situation has changed from an electoral crisis to what is now a human rights crisis, a humanitarian crisis,” McGee said.
He also said that the U.S. would lift sanctions and disburse billions of dollars to Zimbabwe if a new government were to take power.
His comments came after an association of Zimbabwean doctors said its members had treated at least 323 patients who had been beaten and tortured since the elections.
Frazer’s onslaught represented a further tightening of the diplomatic pressure on Mugabe after a controversial Chinese arms shipment which was headed for Zimbabwe turned back.
China had been under massive international pressure not to go through with the planned delivery of a massive cache of weapons from a ship, the An Yue Jiang, despite defending the purchase by the Mugabe regime.
After the United States publicly called for the ship to turn back, and lobbied neighboring countries not to help it reach its final destination, the Chinese government announced that the mission was being abandoned.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has called for an arms embargo on Zimbabwe. Frazer on Thursday said the United States would “seriously consider” the proposal and called on China to “act responsibly.”
Wire reports
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Scrote
What does Mbeki say? Does he still support the unelected dictator Mugabe?
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unscrejects
Scrote: "What does Mbeki say?"
What can he say? He's trembling in fear. What you and the rest of the world don't realize is that Mbeki was in on the deal to crash the Zimbabwean economy. I've been sitting on the evidence since November 1997 and the press have ignored me. Mandela and a certain Asian country did Mugabe in for his intervention in the Congo. It cost South African and certain Asian entities a mint in cancelled sweet heart deal mining concessions in Katanga province. Mugabe is sitting on piles of smoking guns - pointing to Mbeki and all the SADC (Nigeria included) heads of state. No African leader will dare open his mouth against Mugabe since it is quite easy to prove that that leader took cash and other inducements between October 1997 and March 1998 when the coup plot against Bob was hatched. Mazda declined the 32 Million US it was offered to destroy Zimbabwe's economy. Call Mazda and they'll dig up the evidence for you. Mugabe is the only one telling the truth about the crisis. The so-called advocates for regime change in Zimbabwe are the culprits that created the monster Mugabe is said to be today. Call Edwina Gibbs of Rueters Tokyo - I phoned her no less than four times in 1997 to tip her off about the plot (at the time Japanese companies were being given cash inducements...). She told me, "Nobody would be interested in your story. Multi-nationals do coups in Africa all the time..." This one was different I said. The documents hand delivered to Mazda clearly stated that the objective was to cause such terrible economic hardships on the blacks that after "their beloved Mugabe failed to ease their suffering, they will rise up and overthrow him... you Mazda will have no blood on your hands. The people doing the coup will be the black ZImbabweans themselves. Mugabe has to go for his intervention in the COngo and for now talking about taxing tobacco production to raise funds for his army...". 18 months is all it'll take they said and " we have the total support of all white businesses and farmers in Zimbabwe. In fact as we speak the farmers have agreed to cease delivery of crops to the government collection points until Mugabe is gone. We are payng them for their support. And a new head of state has already been nominated out of Mugabes cabinet. They are all in with us. We have no problem with the government of Zimbabwe. It's just him - Mugabe, he's become to difficult for us to handle." sic
Heck even the SUN balked at publishing. The world isn't as morally straight as it's pretending to be.
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skipthesong
farmers have agreed to cease delivery of crops to the government collection points until Mugabe is gone"
So its not true their farms are being confiscated?
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unscrejects
skipthesong
sorry for the confussion. The farmers stopped crop delivery from October 1997. After waiting for a few months and realizing that there indeed was somethinf fishy going on Mugabe asked them to state their allegence - to Zimbabwe or to South Africa. They ran to London and called Peter Hain to talk to Mugabe. Mugabe then told them to lay down their ploughs. The war veerans who had been a constant thorn in Mugabe's side said, "We told you so. These farmers are traitors." And they started to invade the farms. I spent most of '83-'85 in a group that was responsible for beating the hell out of war veterans who were squatting on farms. Mugabe was not taking too kindly to their demands for any land. In 1997 -98 he gave the farmers the benefit of the doubt since many denied any knowledge of the Standard Bank document (I have the original newspaper article if you're interested. Nov. 2 1997 - even though the bank was calling it a mere coup scenario and should not be taken seriously the farmers were no longer applying for their annual Forex. And worse was that under Zimbabwean law (carried over from Rhodesia) commercial crop production was restricted to white farmers only. Mugabe had a major headache but the foreign media didn't seem to have a clue of what was being created. Add to that Peter Thatchel, Peter Hain and Claire Short and we have a disaster.
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WhiteHawk
What, you mean Jimmy Carter didn't monitor the election?
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unscrejects
Correct me if I'm mistaken, but isn't Jendayi Frazer half Zimbabwean? And wasn't her name Tendayi (Shona for "be grateful") a few years ago?
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