Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said Saturday he would contest a presidential runoff poll in his violence-wracked country, but called for international peacekeepers and observers to ensure a fair vote.
Tsvangirai, who beat veteran President Robert Mugabe in a first round of voting in March, also called for an end to violence in Zimbabwe to allow the as yet unscheduled second round to take place.
"A run-off election could finally knock out the dictator Mugabe for good," he told reporters in South Africa, adding that he would return home in the next two days despite the threat of a treason charge. Tsvangirai had previously refused to say whether he would take part even though failure to do so would have handed a victory to Mugabe and has accused the government of organising a campaign of terror against his supporters. Zimbabwean doctors, trade unions and teachers have described beatings and intimidation by government-backed militias and the authorities have been rounding up an increasing number of high-profile opponents.
The MDC has said more than 30 of its supporters have been killed since election day and thousands more tortured or injured, but those figures have been disputed by the Zimbabwean government. Tsvangirai appealed to the 14-member regional body of Southern African states, the Southern African Development Community, to help the election to take place.
"We have given some conditions to SADC for the runoff," he said, before listing them as an end to all violence, access for international election observers, changes to Zimbabwe's electoral commission (ZEC), media freedom and peacekeepers from SADC.
In its first reaction to Tsvangirai's statement, Zimbabwean Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa rejected outside interference - or "any conditionalities outside our legislation" - but said he hoped a runoff could take place "as soon as possible." Tsvangirai had strong criticism for the ZEC and said failure to hold a second round of voting before May 23, as required under Zimbabwean law, risked rendering the election process illegitimate.
Results from the first round were delayed by the ZEC for five weeks and no date has been given for the second-round runoff despite the legal requirement for it to take place within 21 days of the first-round results being announced.
"The ZEC has a legal obligation to fulfil that next step," he added. "If they don't fulfil that, then they will have set off on a campaign of delegitimising it (the runoff)." First-round results were published on May 2 and ZEC officials have hinted that a second round could take up to a year to organise. Tsvangirai's decision to return home brings dangers for the former trade union leader, who is threatened by a treason charge in his homeland.
He has been abroad since shortly after the first round of elections in March but had begun to face criticism for his absence at a time when his supporters were being attacked. International efforts to resolve the crisis have continued apace in recent days.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke Friday with African leaders in Botswana, Zambia and Tanzania, as well as former UN chief Kofi Annan, to push for a solution to the deadlock and violence, her office announced. Also an Friday, South African President Thabo Mbeki, the region's chief mediator on Zimbabwe, held intensive talks with Mugabe in Harare.
Tsvangirai has called for Mbeki to be axed as a mediator over his softly-softly approach, while the UN, the United States, Britain and other Western powers have called for free elections to take place. Mugabe, Africa's oldest leader and a former liberation fighter, has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980. "The run-off election could be the final round in a very long fight to liberate ourselves from our former liberator," Tsvangirai said Saturday.
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