APA-Harare (Zimbabwe) Zimbabwe’s main opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) leader Nelson Chamisa has described last week’s general elections as a “gigantic fraud” and vowed to overturn the outcome in court.
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) announced on Saturday that President Emmerson Mnangagwa, 80, had won a second term with 52.6 percent of the ballots against 44 percent for Chamisa and that the former’s ZANU PF had garnered 136 parliamentary seats compared to 73 for the CCC.
However, Chamisa told journalists in Harare late Sunday faulted ZEC for announcing an outcome based on doctored figures, claiming that he had beaten his rival in the presidential poll held concurrently with elections for National Assembly members and local government councillors on August 23 and 24.
“The vote will be challenged, it was fraught with unprecedented illegality,” the opposition leader said.
He said his party had a number of tools at its disposal to use to overturn Mnangagwa’s victory.
“We want to ensure that we put finality to this tomfoolery games. Enough of shenanigans. Of course, some will say, ‘How you will do this?’ Well, we have a million tools at our disposal and we will not repeat the story of 2018,” he said.
This is the second time the opposition is challenging the outcome of an electoral contesting in which he claims to have beaten Mnangagwa.
In 2018, the Constitutional Court ruled in favour of Mnangagwa on the grounds that Chamisa’s legal team had failed to produce evidence that polling station forms – commonly known here as V11 forms – had been tampered with to come up with the final outcome.
“We have the V11s…. They show that we are winning and we won this election even if it was tough (and) under unfair conditions,” Chamisa said.
The conduct of the polls has been criticised by observers from the Southern African Development Community, African Union and European Union who have cited several irregularities, including voter intimidation and late opening of polling stations in opposition strongholds due to late delivery of ballot papers.
Some polling stations in the capital Harare only opened around 10pm (2000 GMT) when most voters had gone home.
JN/APA