<http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Zimbabwe-Elections.html>

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Opposition officials said they had won a voting extension from Judge Ben Hlatshwayo for the entire country. Justice Minister Patrick Chinimasa told opposition lawyers that he would launch an urgent appeal to the Supreme Court Sunday night to reverse the lower court's ruling, but it was not expected to rule until Monday.

About an hour after the ruling, 60 riot police charged into the Glen Norah polling station in Harare, chasing away between 2,500 and 3,000 people waiting to vote, said an opposition observer, who said he was too frightened to give his name. The police locked the polling station and then moved into the street, threatening anyone who approached the station.
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Have you been watching this on TV? The lines to vote are tremendous. So many people couldn't vote yesterday that they camped out overnight to be first in line this morning. The voting might be extended to a third day.

The current leader, Robert Mugabe, is so viciously opposed to homosexuals that he makes Fred Phelps look like Ru Paul. (Now there's an odd notion.) He has more support in the rural areas than the cities, so he closed down urban polling centers. There are only 420 foreign observers in the entire country to watch for voting fraud.

Once the vote is over, the counting begins.

Oh shit, Please NO more chads!!! So how is my canidate doing in the voting? Buga Buga Shawing. He's the best.


Now going into third day of voting but only in the two major cities. Maybe they're afraid to start counting and will keep the voting process for weeks.

[ March 11, 2002: Message edited by: thumper ]

Considering how few of us Americans actually even bother to vote, no matter how convenient we make it, we ought to be ashamed with the visual reminders of what others are willing to go through in other parts of the world to vote.

In the most recent election, only 21% of the registered voters [which is a much lower number obviously than those even eligible] of Los Angeles County voted. And I'm sure that none camped out for days, braved beatings or threats on their life to do so.

Perhaps while we're thumping our own chests for being the "greatest country on earth" we could answer our own concurrent collective question: What can we do to help?

I'd say vote--just as a starter.

[quote]Originally posted by Brent:
Considering how few of us Americans actually even bother to vote, no matter how convenient we make it, we ought to be ashamed with the visual reminders of what others are willing to go through in other parts of the world to vote.

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I haven't seen (on TV) lines like that since the first elections in South Africa open to blacks.

[quote]Perhaps while we're thumping our own chests for being the "greatest country on earth" we could answer our own concurrent collective question: What can we do to help?

I'd say vote--just as a starter.

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That and pay your taxes.

In light of how awful life has gotten for just about everyone in Zimbabwe, you know something went very seriously wrong if Mugabe gets re-elected. In a fair and honest election, Mugabe's opponent would get about 99% of the vote, but there will be tremendous joy and relief if he gets 51% -- anything to oust the corrupt evil dictator.

Switching to our Stateside elections, I have to differ with my fellow Americans who critize nonvoters. First of all, our democracy has remained and will remain intact, whether 99% or 21% of the voters turn out. And let's not forget that the right to vote also includes the right **not** to vote -- whether it's benign neglect (believe it or not, a good percentage of the voting public doesn't vote because they trust things will be fine one way or another), apathy borne of disgust (contempt for Dems and GOPers alike, and toss in Ralph Nader while you're at it), sheer laziness, or any other reason under the sun (illiteracy, distrust/contempt for anything to do with the federal government, distance from a polling center ... the list goes on and on).

In a free society, citizens should be free not to vote if they so choose. I guess that in a free society, the holier-than-thou's have a right to get up on their high horses and issue finger-wagging lectures if they so choose too (ho hum). Aha! But then I am allowed to tell the finger-waggers to give nonvoters the benefit of a doubt, mind their own business, take their civic self-righteousness, and shove it up their a**! Isn't a free society a wonderful thing?

PS: In case you're wondering, I always vote. Yeah, I'm one of the three guys who actually pull the rusting, cobweb-ridden "Repulican" levers in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. You can't even begin to imagine my indignation when Ted Kennedy ran unopposed - with no space for a write-in candidate!

[ March 11, 2002: Message edited by: BoSoxRudy ]

[quote]Originally posted by BoSoxRudy:
And let's not forget that the right to vote also includes the right **not** to vote -- whether it's benign neglect, ... sheer laziness, or any other reason under the sun (illiteracy, distrust/contempt for anything to do with the federal government, distance from a polling center ... the list goes on and on).

PS: In case you're wondering, I always vote.

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[I snipped a little]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/afr...000/1867624.stm

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In the Harare suburb of Glen Norah police wielding batons fired tear gas to disperse 600 people waiting to vote.

When ordered to go home, they began chanting "Change, change, we want to vote!" the Associated Press news agency reported.

Some voters queued for more than 50 hours in vain.

Reginald Matchaba-Hove, chairman of the Zimbabwe Election Support Network, said his monitors had confirmed problems at four polling stations when voting was stopped.

He said that at one polling station the monitor reported police beating up MDC agents as riot police took ballot boxes away.

He said: "I am sad to report that this has been one of the most shambolic and chaotic elections we have witnessed."
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Shambolic? I've never seen the word before, though I know what it means.

Fifty hours! Laziness indeed. Look at the pix.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/afr...000/1865455.stm

[ March 11, 2002: Message edited by: twin58 ]

Election shocker - Mugabe wins.

So for the foreseeable future, there will be no homos in Zimbabwe. Which may be the least of their worries. What's troubling is that the other African nations have certified the election was "fair and open" when they knew otherwise. The tendency to draw to circle around and protect their own is so incredibly short-sighted, although in South Africa's case, they're trying to make sure they don't add fuel to a rising movement like the one that has been going on in Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe is deserving of a boycott like South Africa was--although it's hard to know what would get Mugabe out. Since he says that we as homos are worse than dogs and deserve to die, and yet that doesn't really get much of a reaction in the world--who knows what will?

Imagine if someone said that about Jews/Blacks/Muslims/Hispanics etc. Strange how calling for the death of an entire group elicits mainly shrugs.

Those that fight that kind of a system deserve our admiration and support. Since we're congratulating ourselves for our liberation of women from the Taliban [as if we were even slightly interested before], and are zooming in on Iraq as our next program of liberation, it doesn't seem too much of a stretch to at least give lip-service to eliminating such a horrible despot determined to eliminate our kind.

Mugabe has made life a living hell for almost all of Zimbabwe and, in the process, almost completely debilitated Zimbabwe's economy. Although I certainly favor publicly denouncing Mugabe and the sham of these so-called elections, I worry that economic sanctions on Zimbabwe will hurt the citizens the most, while allowing Mugabe's despotic rule to continue with little disruption.

[quote]Originally posted by BoSoxRudy:
...I worry that economic sanctions on Zimbabwe will hurt the citizens the most, while allowing Mugabe's despotic rule to continue with little disruption.

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Economic sanctions won't hurt them any more than economic globalization and the policies of the IMF and World Bank already have.

I don't expect the opposition to take this lightly. There will be more unrest.