Harare - Zimbabwe expects economic expansion of 3.4 percent in 2013 from the 5 percent seen earlier and needs next week's elections to be free and fair to help rekindle growth, Finance Minister Tendai Biti said on Thursday.
“The bulk cause of the underperformance of the economy has had to do with elections,” Biti told a news conference, adding that output in the mining and agriculture sectors had plunged.
Biti is a senior official in the Movement for Democratic Change, which will square off against President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF in polls next week.
Biti has previously said the government has no money to pay for the poll. - Reuters