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Harare - President Robert Mugabe's government has dispatched youths from the ruling Zanu PF party to Zambia to help load maize it badly needs to placate a hungry electorate ahead of elections in two weeks time. Mugabe, whose controversial land reforms are blamed for plunging Zimbabwe into severe food shortages, last week told villagers at a campaign rally in Mahusekwa district that Zambian officials were delaying delivery of more than 300 000 tonnes of maize purchased by his government. The Zimbabwean leader - who draws most of his support from rural areas that are the hardest hit by hunger - said his government was considering sending a team of officials to Zambia to assist authorities there to speed up delivery of maize. Authoritative sources said the government last week hurriedly recruited about 70 youths from its Mashonaland Central province stronghold and issued them with emergency travel documents from the Bindura passport office to travel to Zambia.

"The youths traveled to Zambia at the weekend and they will provide extra labor, helping truckers load the maize," said a government official, who spoke on condition he was not named. It was not clear whether the Zambian government had issued temporary work permits to the Zimbabwean loaders. Agriculture Minister Rugare Gumbo confirmed that the government had dispatched manpower to Zambia to help quicken delivery of maize, adding that the loading of maize would now be done round the clock. He said: "We have paid for the maize and we have to quicken the loading. We have an urgent case here and we can't just fold our arms. The government now has a team in Zambia assisting with logistics and supervising the whole thing as well. Loading will be round the clock and we should see vastly improved deliveries by the end of this week."

Zimbabwe, also in the grip of its worst ever economic crisis, has battled severe food shortages for the past eight years after Mugabe's controversial land reforms displaced established white commercial farmers and replaced them with either incompetent or inadequately funded black peasant farmers. A joint crop assessment report by the Ministry of Agriculture and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) released last week said Zimbabwe could face another grain shortfall this year because of a shortage of seed and fertilizers that affected the cropping season. International relief agencies have been helping feed at least three million people or about a quarter of the 12 million Zimbabweans because of persistently poor harvests in the southern African country. Mugabe, who says his government has paid for about 250 000 tonnes of maize from Malawi and South Africa, has made provision of food one of the key planks of his campaign message.

But the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party earlier this week accused the government's Grain Marketing Board -- the only firm permitted to trade in maize and wheat in the country - of distributing food through traditional leaders known for supporting Mugabe and Zanu PF. The opposition party said its supporters were being denied food as punishment for not backing Mugabe and Zanu PF. Mugabe, 84, who is seeking a fresh five-year term at the polls, is facing his biggest electoral test at the month-end when he squares up against his respected former finance minister Simba Makoni and the popular and charismatic MDC leader, Morgan Tsvangirai. Political analysts say an unfair electoral playing field guarantees Mugabe victory despite clear evidence that he has failed to tame a rampant economic crisis that has manifested itself in the world's highest inflation rate of over 100 000 percent, massive unemployment and poverty.

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