Harare - Zimbabwe's main opposition leader
Nelson Chamisa made a veiled threat on Wednesday to boycott
elections on July 30 if there is no agreement between the
independent election agency and political parties on ballot
papers.
Chamisa and his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) are the
main rivals to President Emmerson Mnangagwa in the first
presidential and parliamentary vote since Robert Mugabe resigned
last November following an army coup.
The MDC is wary of any attempt to put it at a disadvantage
to Mnangagwa and the ruling ZANU-PF party, insisting there be a
deal on how to design, print and store ballot papers.
Chamisa said his party rejected the papers being printed by
the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC).
"We do not and will not accept the current ballot paper that
has been printed without our participation," he told reporters.
Asked whether he would boycott the polls if ZEC ignored his
party's demands, Chamisa said: "There will be no election, there
can't be an election. Choose what to call it, but there can't be
an election."
He would not reveal how the MDC could stop the vote, in
which 23 candidates are running for president, but added that
the opposition would not "repeat the mistakes of 2013" when it
suffered a crushing defeat.
The MDC called Mugabe's victory five years ago a monumental
fraud that had been engineered through manipulation of the
voters' register by state security agents.
ZEC chief Priscilla Chigumba said her commission alone was
empowered to deal with the issue of ballot papers, and demands
by the MDC were meant to usurp its powers.
Presidential and parliamentary ballots were being produced
by the central bank's printing arm Fidelity Printers, she added
in a statement.
An MDC official said the party had notified police it would
demonstrate next Wednesday to press its demands. Thousands of
MDC supporters marched to the ZEC offices on June 5, demanding
reforms that the party said were vital for a credible vote.
Zimbabwe Defence Forces spokesman Colonel Overson Mugwisi
separately rejected MDC allegations that soldiers had been
deployed in rural areas to campaign for ZANU-PF and intimidate
opponents.