Suspicion as Zimbabwe Election Results Trickle In

HARARE, Zimbabwe — If Zimbabwe's regime had wanted to maximize public suspicion surrounding the elections, it could scarcely have done so more effectively yesterday.

First, there were no results at all for about 36 hours after polls closed Saturday.

Then, the declarations began to trickle out yesterday morning.

But they were not for the crucial battle for the presidency between Robert Mugabe and the leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, Morgan Tsvangirai.

Instead, the Electoral Commission chose to concentrate on the election for the lower house of parliament.

At 6 a.m., it was disclosed that the MDC and Mr. Mugabe's Zanu-PF had won three seats each. Five hours later, Zimbabwe learned that the two parties had another nine seats each.

By 7 p.m., when another tranche of results were disclosed, the two parties were apparently still neck and neck with 26 seats each.

No hard conclusions can be drawn from these announcements, save that no random declaration of results could explain them. The Electoral Commission was clearly working to a plan.

In a cafe in central Harare yesterday, a businessman listened to the results on his mobile phone, relaying them to rapt customers and staff. Some of the listeners suspected that the neck-and-neck tally was a bid by Zimbabwe's Electoral Commission to disclose the results in a careful order to give the appearance of a genuinely tight contest — before Zanu-PF gradually noses ahead.