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Voting Tsvangirai will lead to civil war - Police Chief
David Baxter, Association of Zimbabwe Journalists
May 07, 2008

Mutare (Zimbabwe) - Voting for Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition MDC in the presidential run-off election expected in three weeks' time, is tantamount to plunging the country into a civil war, a high ranking police officer has warned.

The warning was issued by Senior Assistant Commissioner Mabunda during a meeting with police officers here on Tuesday, stunned police sources told zimbabwejournalists.com. Mabunda is a top lieutenant and confidante to Augustine Chihuri, the police chief who in the past has issued threats that he will not salute Tsvangirai or anyone without proper liberation war credentials. Mabunda is on a countrywide tour - meeting officers of all ranks and warning them of the dangers of voting for Tsvangirai in the expected run-off election.

He vowed during the meeting with the police officers here drawn from all the province's eight districts that President Robert Mugabe will never be ousted by Tsvangirai.

Should that happen, Mabunda reportedly said a civil war will immediately break out. Most junior officers within the army and the police force are believed to have deserted Mugabe in the ballot box and the warnings by Mabunda are meant to scare them into doing the ruling party's bidding, especially now as thousands are being left homeless in a brutal campaign in the rural communities that supported the opposition in the March 29 elections.

The meeting was held at the police Main Camp on the edge of the city's central business district. Officers who attended the meeting said the atmosphere in the meeting was tense. "We were told in no uncertain terms that voting for Tsvangirai is just like voting for war," said one officer, a constable based at Mutare Central police station. The ruling party got fewer votes than the opposition at polling stations in the March 29 election and some of those booths recording high votes for the MDC are said to have been within police camps.

"Mabunda told us that anyone who will dare continue supporting or sympathizing with the MDC will be in serious problems," said another officer. The warning by the top police officer coincides with reports of escalating violence targeted at MDC supporters in both the urban and rural areas. The violence is widely blamed on state security agents, war veterans and Zanu PF militants. Thousands of opposition supporters have been displaced while about 200 have been badly assaulted.

Last Saturday the MDC provincial youth leader for Manicaland, Knowledge Nyamhoka, was abducted by yet unknown people at midnight from his Sakubva home and taken to a secluded area where he was badly beaten and left for dead. The MDC says Nyamhoka was abducted by security agents. He was rescued by passersby who found him lying unconscious who took him to a private hospital, the Seventh Avenue Surgical Unit, where he is recuperating.

Two other youth activists from Nyanga were also rushed to the same hospital after meeting the same fate as their leader. The MDC chairman in Manicaland, Patrick Chitaka, said the situation within most opposition strongholds was fast degenerating and urgent measures should be put in place to avert genocide from occurring in Zimbabwe.

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