Pre-election violence, which has been building to a crescendo in Zimbabwe, has finally become too great, forcing the leading candidate Morgan Tsvangarai to withdraw from the process, to prevent further loss of life. Robert Mugabe had said, “Only God who appointed me will remove me,” and had given a clear warning that he did not intend to accept the results of the presidential run-off if they went against him: “We will never allow an event like an election to reverse our independence, our sovereignty,” and “We are prepared to go to war. We are prepared to fight for our country if we lose it.”
Mugabe’s thugs have now for several weeks been terrorising people who are suspected of supporting the opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangarai. Members of the opposition party have been stopped from campaigning and arrested numerous times. The party secretary is in jail on trumped-up charges. It is apparent that the senior leaders of the military and police support Mugabe, so what could Tsvangarai have hoped to achieve even if he did win the run-off poll, and even if the votes had been counted fairly?
For the immediate future, Mugabe will remain president of Zimbabwe. However, with inflation said to be approaching 2,000,000%, with the economy in freefall, and with Mugabe’s 85th birthday approaching, something will have to give soon. The problem is, the people who are responsible for the country’s current parlous state are the people who have the guns and have shown no compuction about using them.