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'Zim violence down'
15/03/2005 20:10 - (SA)
Harare - With a little more than two weeks to go before key elections in Zimbabwe, some rights groups and police say the campaign so far has been largely spared of the political violence that marred the 2000 and 2002 polls.
President Robert Mugabe has called for "zero tolerance" to violence as his country comes under scrutiny by neighbouring countries in southern Africa asked to render their verdict on whether the March 31 vote will be free and fair.
The main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) maintains, however, that a campaign of intimidation continues unabated, waged by the militias of Mugabe's ruling Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF).
"There has been a considerable decrease in election-related violence if we compare with the same period in the last election," Munyaradzi Bidi, director of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Association, told AFP.
Bidi said the call for a "zero tolerance to violence" was having an impact.
Allegations of vote-rigging
Zimbabwe's last elections in 2000 and 2002 were tainted by violence and allegations of vote-rigging, triggering a political crisis in the southern African country and prompting the European Union and the United States to slap sanctions on Harare.
"There was a lot of hate speech that fuelled violence in the last election," Bidi said, "and total abandonment on the part of the government of their responsibility to uphold the rule of law."
Bidi said that, so far, his group had recorded 15 cases of assault and it also had helped one family to safety after it received threats from Zanu-PF supporters.
"But, it's nothing compared to 2002 when we recorded 85 deaths and 152 families were displaced," he said.
Hundreds of rural families fled their homes in the months leading up to Zimbabwe's 2002 presidential election and were given safe haven by opposition and human rights activists in towns and cities.
Police spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena said 42 people died in political violence in 2002 "and we have not recorded any deaths during this campaign".
The MDC claimed at least 100 of its supporters were killed in the last campaign, including the driver of leader Morgan Tsvangirai and two other members of his campaign team.
Youths went on a rampage
They were burnt to death when their car was set on fire by suspected Zanu-PF militants.
The worst incidence of violence in the campaign so far was in early February when a gang of 30 ruling party youths went on a rampage in the town of Norton west of Harare, beating up opposition supporters and stabbing a police officer.
The 30 were arrested, part of the total of 67 Zanu-PF members who have been arrested during the campaign and charged with various offences along with 42 MDC supporters, according to the police.
Lawyer Jessie Majome from the National Constitutional Assembly says "the government wants to be seen to be doing free and fair elections. That is why they are in a hurry to say there is no violence."
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