Several Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front leaders, including Emmerson Mnangagwa, were reported to have instructed their local organisers not to use intimidation to elicit votes in the 2005 elections because they had realised that it did not pay.
The United States embassy reached this conclusion in the run up to the 2005 parliamentary elections where there was reduced violence compared to the 2000 elections.
The embassy said one of the factors could be that some members of ZANU-PF had realised that rather than ensuring victory, intimidation may have precipitated a voter backlash in 2000.
Mnangagwa lost the 2000 elections in his urban constituency of Kwekwe to relatively unknown Blessing Chebundo of the Movement for Democratic Change.
Full cable:
Viewing cable 05HARARE459, ZIMBABWE’S LESS VIOLENT ELECTION
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 HARARE 000459
SIPDIS
AF/S FOR BNEULING
NSC FOR SENIOR AFRICA DIRECTOR C. COURVILLE, D. TEITELBAUM
E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/31/2010
SUBJECT: ZIMBABWE’S LESS VIOLENT ELECTION
REF: A. HARARE 384
¶B. HARARE 383
¶C. HARARE 381
Classified By: Ambassador Christopher W. Dell under Section 1.4 b/d
——
Summary
——
¶1. (C) This is the latest in a series of cables post is doing
assessing the legal setting, pre-electoral environment, and
conduct of Zimbabwe,s March 31 parliamentary elections.
According to everyone involved in the election, violence is
much reduced from the 2000 parliamentary and 2002
presidential elections. We are seeing reports of continuing
intimidation and more overt violence may yet escalate in the
campaign,s remaining weeks. However, both sides have
largely adhered to their high-level public declarations of
the need for tolerance and non-violence. There are a variety
of factors that explain this welcome development, including:
regional and international pressure, ZANU-PF infighting and
overconfidence, and the opposition MDC’s late entry into the
race. The relative lack of violence may provide a foundation
for renewed intra-party talks following the election. End
Summary.
—————-
Reduced Violence
—————-
¶2. (C) President Mugabe and other senior GOZ officials have
repeatedly emphasized in public that the March 31
parliamentary elections must be non-violent. At the end of
January, Vice President Joyce Mujuru led a well-publicized
national prayer service for peaceful elections, and most
ruling party candidates have consistently echoed the
leadership’s rhetoric on violence at campaign rallies and
media interviews. The opposition MDC has made similar
appeals for a non-violent election and even the police have
played a constructive role. Police Commissioner Augustine
Chihuri and other senior officials have publicly and
privately reiterated a “zero tolerance” policy toward
political violence.
¶3. (C) That said, contested Zimbabwean elections have always
engendered violence, leading observers to predict that 2004
would follow the familiar pattern of a rise in
campaign-related violence beginning around October. However,
as the elections on March 31 draw near, the anticipated spike
in violence has not materialized. To be sure, the run-up to
elections has not been without incident. Still, MDC
officials and NGOs such as The Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO
Forum agree that violence is much lower now than during the
2000 and 2002 elections (ref A). MDC and NGO contacts
advise, for instance, that “pungwes” — days-long political
indoctrination sessions to which locals were force-marched
and sometimes beaten during past elections — have vanished
from the scene, even in the most remote rural areas.
¶4. (C) In addition, in many rural and urban areas, the
militia activity of past elections has reportedly noticeably
diminished. One resident from Chitungwiza, a high-density
district on the outskirts of Harare, advised that ruling
party cadres are still coming door-to-door, hectoring locals
to attend ZANU-PF neighborhood rallies, but unlike in the
past locals felt free to ignore them without fear of
retribution. Although the public display of party loyalties
still triggers occasional inter-party violence and
harassment, MDC and NGO contacts and diplomatic observers
around the country report that MDC posters and t-shirts are
evident practically nation-wide, again, in marked departure
from 2000 and 2002.
Intimidation May be Rising
———————
¶5. (C) During the past two weeks, however, we have received
reports of increasing intimidation in some parts of the
country, particularly in rural and peri-urban areas of
Mashonaland, the center of the country and ZANU-PF,s
&heartland.8 An American legal permanent resident
Zimbabwean visiting his family home in Mashonaland Central,
for example, reported that ruling party elements had been
conducting door-to-door campaigns, telling residents that
translucent ballot boxes would enable local authorities to
see how people voted, and that the “blackboots8 would later
visit those who had voted for the MDC. In meetings on March
17 with Embassy staff, MDC candidates in Mashonaland East
cited similar examples of intimidation. ZANU-PF supporters
had been seen recording the names of those attending MDC
rallies, and voters had been instructed to go to the polls
with their village chief or headman, who would insure votes
went to the ruling party.
¶6. (C) With less than two weeks to go before the election,
however, many here still fear that the more relaxed
environment represents a ruling party experiment, and that
ZANU-PF may yet unleash violence in areas where its
traditional hold is most tenuous. We have heard reports, for
instance, that some ZANU-PF candidates and local organizers
recognize that the party cannot win without violence in their
constituency, and have been pressing the leadership for more
latitude on intimidation. In that regard, the increasing
reports of escalating intimidation may signal the ruling
party,s return to traditional tactics. Even without further
intimidation and violence, residual fear ) the legacy of
violence in past elections ) remains a very real factor.
Causes of Reduced Violence
————————
¶7. (C) Several factors help explain the change in Mugabe and
ZANU-PF,s tactics during these elections. Many observers
cite the confidence ) some would say overconfidence ) of
the regime, which seems to believe it can score a victory
without overt violence. By all accounts, years of repressive
tactics have the electorate cowed. To boot, the opposition
MDC observed a conditional boycott of the elections in late
2004 and early 2005, bolstering the ruling party,s sense of
strength. ZANU-PF,s preoccupation with its own internal
politics may also have played a role in reducing violence.
The Tsholotsho affair, an espionage scandal, and divisive
primaries distracted the party from pursuing its usual
heavy-handed tactics, and took some of the focus off the
opposition.
¶8. (C) The ruling party,s new non-violent stance is also
central to Mugabe,s attempt to regain legitimacy. The GOZ
can be expected to showcase the reduction in violence to make
its case that it has adhered to the Southern African
Development Community,s (SADC) election principles, even as
its performance has fallen short in many key areas. The
knowledge that he is under close scrutiny by the
international community, especially the U.S. and U.K.,
certainly contributed to Mugabe,s decision to ratchet down
the violence. He seems to have done so as well as part of a
more or less explicit understanding with his SADC neighbors
that this was key to winning their endorsement of the process
and outcome. According to unconfirmed rumors, President
Mbeki told Mugabe that SADC would bless the elections,
regardless of outcome, as long as they were non-violent and
Mugabe will, in turn, point to SADC,s approval as proof of
his mandate.
¶9. (C) Finally, another factor may have been the assessment
of some in the ruling party that its intimidating tactics,
rather then ensuring victory, may have precipitated a voter
backlash in 2000. Several ZANU-PF MPs have confirmed this to
us, and we have heard numerous reports of MPs, including
Speaker Emmerson Mnangagwa, who lost his seat in 2000,
instructing their local organizers not to use intimidation to
elicit votes. Whatever the causes, the diminution in
violence this year appears to have given the MDC an opening.
Senior MDC leaders tell us that even a last minute spike in
violence will now be too late to overcome the connection the
party has made with the electorate. They continue to predict
a good electoral showing for their party, which in turn could
spur resumed intra-party talks following the election to
resolve Zimbabwe,s debilitating political crisis.
¶10. (C) COMMENT. SADC will almost certainly justify its
expected endorsement of the elections largely based on a
comparison to the 2000 and 2002 elections, citing in
particular the much lower levels of violence as &proof8 of
a positive trend. In reply, we will want to emphasize that
the outcome should be judged against the SADC principles and
guidelines (as well as the recommendations of the 2002 South
African national observer team) and not by comparison to
other, even more deeply flawed previous elections. END
COMMENT.
Dell
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