Poll results trickle in for crisis-hit Zimbabwe

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe’s presidential election results remained unknown on Thursday as President Robert Mugabe called a meeting of his top leadership to discuss how to face the biggest crisis of his 28-year rule.

Amid uncertainty over whether he can hang on to power, authorities said results of elections to the senate, the upper house of parliament -- which must precede presidential results -- were beginning to trickle in after delays because of “logistical problems”.

According to the first batch of results issued by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) on Thursday night, opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and Mugabe’s ruling ZANU-PF each won five senate seats out of 60 contested.

Zimbabweans have been eager for word on Mugabe’s fate since he lost control of parliament on Wednesday for the first time.

The country has been waiting since Saturday to hear whether Mugabe has also been defeated in the presidential vote, as the MDC says.

The MDC, and many Zimbabweans, believe the unprecedented delay in issuing results masks attempts by Mugabe’s entourage to find a way out of the crisis.

DISCONTENT

Mugabe faces deep discontent as Zimbabwe suffers with the world’s highest inflation rate of more than 100,000 percent, a virtually worthless currency and severe food and fuel shortages.

Ruling ZANU-PF party sources said the president would chair a party leadership meeting called for Friday.

Senior ZANU-PF official Didymus Mutasa declined to comment on whether the party was planning for a runoff against MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, although another official said earlier it was ready for a vote and would win it.

“All I can confirm is there is a politburo meeting,” said Mutasa, the party secretary for administration.

Analysts said Mugabe was believed to have convened the leadership to discuss their next move after ZANU-PF’s first defeat in a parliamentary election and to gauge how much support there was for him running in a second round presidential poll.

Asked about media reports that the government had launched a crackdown on some MDC officials on Thursday night, two party officials said they were not aware of such measures.

“That said, it is important to note that with this regime you cannot rule out anything,” MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa told Reuters.

The United States voiced concern about possible manipulation of the vote count.

Former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan urged that the election results be declared “faithfully and accurately”.

ZANU-PF projections show Mugabe failing to win a majority for the first time since he took power after independence from Britain in 1980. But they also show Tsvangirai falling short of the required absolute majority to avoid a second round.

All the signs are that Mugabe, a liberation war leader still respected in Africa, is in the worst trouble of his rule after facing an unprecedented challenge in the elections because of the collapse of the Zimbabwean economy.

Deputy Information Minister Bright Matonga said earlier the party was ready for a second round, in the strongest indication yet that Mugabe intends to stand, despite calls by the opposition to concede defeat and avoid embarrassment.

The MDC says Tsvangirai won an absolute majority, based on its own tallies, and no re-run is necessary.

NO CLEAR WINNER

In an interview with Reuters Television, Matonga added: “We think ... there may not be a clear winner of the presidential one (vote) and it points to a re-run.”

In his first public appearance since the March 29 election, Mugabe met the head of an African Union election observer team at his residence in Harare, state television reported.

Asked about his meeting with Mugabe, Sierra Leone’s former President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah told ZTV: “He looked very relaxed, and is of the view that the problems of the country will be resolved amicably, and he is very relaxed about it.”

In Pretoria, South African President Thabo Mbeki, who has mediated between Mugabe and the opposition, called on all sides to respect the outcome of the election.

Final results of the election for parliament’s lower house showed the MDC won 99 seats. ZANU-PF won 97 and a breakaway MDC faction won 10. One independent candidate won a seat.

Authorities have limited the international media’s access to Zimbabwe, and on Thursday Zimbabwean police said they had arrested two foreign journalists, including a New York Times reporter, for working without accreditation.

(Additional reporting by Nelson Banya, Muchena Zigomo, MacDonald Dzirutwe, Cris Chinaka and Gordon Bell in Johannesburg; editing by Michael Georgy and Andrew Roche)