In the end, the strangest fact about Zimbabwe's presidential election last weekend was not that Robert Mugabe stole it, but that he went to such extraordinary lengths to do so. How much simpler it would have been to cancel it and declare himself president for life. A coup of that kind would have had repercussions, but they would not have been so different from those that will follow from the drawn-out electoral sham through which the ageing autocrat has dragged his wretched country. The world must now decide how to respond to this coup by ballot-box, and in particular how to register its concern and disapproval without inflicting unnecessary suffering on the innocent majority of Zimbabweans who have just been robbed of their democratic choice. That they have indeed been robbed should not be in doubt. The plot has involved seizing farms, intimidating supporters of the opposition party, charging its leaders with treason, harassing the press, arresting dissenters, disenfranchising citizens, expelling monitors, ignoring court rulings, obstructing voters and spreading violence throughout the land. And all that was before a vote count that would have been a credit to Enron's auditors. No wonder independent observers, both Zimbabwean and foreign, have called the election neither free nor fair. Only African monitors whitewashed it: South Africa grotesquely declared it "legitimate" (see page 29).
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