Zimbabwean Presidential Election, 2008
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The Republic of Zimbabwe held a presidential election along with a parliamentary election on 29 March 2008. The three major candidates were incumbent President Robert Mugabe of the Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), and Simba Makoni, an independent. As no candidate received an outright majority in the first round, a second round was held on 27 June 2008 between Tsvangirai (with 48% of the first round vote) and Mugabe (43%). Tsvangirai withdrew from the second round a week before it was scheduled to take place, citing violence against his party's supporters. The second round went ahead, despite widespread condemnation, and led to victory for Mugabe. Because of Zimbabwe's dire economic situation, the election was expected to provide President Mugabe with his toughest electoral challenge to date. Mugabe's opponents were critical of the handling of the electoral process, and the government was accused of planning to rig the election. Human Rights Watch said that the election was likely to be "deeply flawed." After the first round, but before the counting was completed, Jose Marcos Barrica, the head of the Southern African Development Community observer mission, described the election as "a peaceful and credible expression of the will of the people of Zimbabwe." No official results were announced for more than a month after the first round. The failure to release results was strongly criticised by the MDC, which unsuccessfully sought an order from the High Court to force their release. An independent projection placed Tsvangirai in the lead, but without the majority needed to avoid a second round. The MDC declared that Tsvangirai won a narrow majority in the first round and initially refused to participate in any second round. ZANU-PF has said that Mugabe will participate in a second round; the party alleged that some electoral officials, in connection with the MDC, fraudulently reduced Mugabe's score, and as a result a recount was conducted. After the recount and the verification of the results, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) announced on 2 May that Tsvangirai won 47.9% and Mugabe won 43.2%, thereby necessitating a run-off, which was to be held on 27 June 2008. Despite Tsvangirai's continuing claims to have won a first round majority, he decided to participate in the second round. The period following the first round was marked by political violence. ZANU-PF and the MDC each blamed the other's supporters for perpetrating the violence; Western governments and prominent Western organisations blamed ZANU-PF for the violence. On 22 June 2008, Tsvangirai announced that he was withdrawing from the run-off, describing it as a "violent sham" and saying that his supporters risked being killed if they voted for him. The second round of elections went ahead with Mugabe as the only actively participating candidate, although Tsvangirai's name remained on the ballot. Mugabe won the second round by an overwhelming margin and was sworn in for another term as President on 29 June. International reaction to the second round has varied. The United States and states of the European Union have called for increased sanctions. On 11 July, the United Nations Security Council considered imposing sanctions on Zimbabwe. The sanctions were vetoed by Russia and China. The African Union has called for a "government of national unity." Preliminary talks to set up conditions for official negotiations began between leading negotiators from both parties on 10 July, and on 22 July, the three party leaders met for the first time in Harare to express their support for a negotiated settlement of disputes arising out of the presidential and parliamentary elections. Negotiations between the parties officially began on 25 July and are currently proceeding with very few details released from the negotiation teams in Pretoria, as coverage by the media is barred from the premises where the negotiations are taking place. The talks were mediated by South African President Thabo Mbeki. A provisional deal was reached on 11 September 2008, involving Tsvangirai chairing the council of ministers and Mugabe chairing a new national security council. By the following January it remained unimplemented due to ongoing disputes between the parties. Read more about Zimbabwean Presidential Election, 2008: Election Rules and Arrangements, Election Day, Vote Counting, SADC Emergency Meeting, Result Famous quotes containing the word presidential:“Because of these convictions, I made a personal decision in the 1964 Presidential campaign to make education a fundamental issue and to put it high on the nation’s agenda. I proposed to act on my belief that regardless of a family’s financial condition, education should be available to every child in the United States—as much education as he could absorb.” |