Zimbabwe goes to polls as ‘the crocodile’ president seeks reelection

Delays marked voting in Zimbabwe on Wednesday as President Emmerson Mnangagwa seeks a second and final term in a country with a history of violent and disputed elections.

This is the second general election since the ouster of longtime ruler Robert Mugabe in a coup in 2017.

Twelve presidential candidates are on the ballot, but the main contest is expected to be between 80-year-old Mr. Mnangagwa, known as “the crocodile,” and 45-year-old opposition leader Nelson Chamisa. Mr. Mnangagwa narrowly beat Mr. Chamisa in a disputed election in 2018.

Mr. Chamisa hopes to break the ruling ZANU-PF party’s 43-year hold on power. Zimbabwe has had only two leaders since gaining independence from white minority rule in 1980.

A runoff election will be held Oct. 2 if no candidate wins a clear majority in the first round. The election will also determine the makeup of the 350-seat parliament and nearly 2,000 local council positions.

“It’s becoming tougher to survive in this country,” said Basil Chendambuya, an early voter in a working-class township in Harare. “I am hoping for change. This is my third time to vote and I am praying hard that this time my vote counts. I am getting desperate, so God has to intervene this time round.”

The father of three said his two adult children are working menial jobs and surviving “hand to mouth.”

The southern African nation of 15 million people has vast mineral resources, including Africa’s largest reserves of lithium, a key component in making electric car batteries. But watchdogs have long alleged that widespread corruption and mismanagement have gutted much of the country’s potential.

European Union chief election observer Fabio Massimo Castaldo told reporters at a polling station in Harare that around 30% of polling stations there had significant delays in opening, often linked to the lack of essential materials, “notably, in many cases, paper ballots.”

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission acknowledged the late distribution of ballot papers at some polling stations and blamed it on delays in their printing “arising from numerous court challenges.” Governing party activists and the opposition had brought a flurry of cases over who could run in both presidential and parliamentary elections.

Ahead of the election, opposition and human rights groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International accused Mr. Mnangagwa of seeking to silence dissent amid rising tensions due to a currency crisis, a sharp hike in food prices, a weakening public health system, and a lack of formal jobs.

After voting, Mr. Mnangagwa expressed confidence he would win. “If I think I am not going to take it, then I will be foolish,” he said. He encouraged people to be peaceful.

As Mr. Chamisa voted, dozens of supporters chanted his name or sang “We want Nelson Chamisa, young blood.”

Mr. Chamisa alleged intimidation in rural areas but said his supporters should be patient and not frustrated. “We are winning this election,” he said. “They know it and that’s why they are panicking.”

Mr. Mnangagwa was a close ally of Mr. Mugabe and served as vice president before a fallout ahead of the 2017 coup. He has sought to portray himself as a reformer, but many accuse him of being even more repressive than the man he helped remove from power.

Zimbabwe has been under United States and EU sanctions for the past two decades over allegations of human rights abuses, charges denied by the governing party. Mr. Mnangagwa has in recent years repeated much of Mr. Mugabe’s rhetoric against the West, accusing it of seeking to topple his regime.

Ahead of the elections, observers from the EU and the U.S. came under criticism from officials and state-run media for alleged bias against the governing party.

The Carter Center, invited by the government to observe the polls, has said 30 members of its 48-member observer team had not yet been accredited on the eve of the elections and any further delay would “hinder its ability to observe polling, counting, and tabulation in many locations.”

Several local human rights activists, including lawyers and a clergyman viewed as critical of the government, were denied accreditation to observe the vote. The U.S. State Department condemned Zimbabwe’s decision to deny accreditation to them and to several foreign journalists.

This story was reported by The Associated Press.