PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party lost a key election yesterday as Zimbabweans showed their disgust at his devastating campaign of shack demolitions.
Japhet Ndabeni-Ncube, of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), polled five times the number of votes won by Mr Mugabe's candidate in mayoral elections in the second city of Bulawayo.
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Mr Ndabeni-Ncube said his victory pointed to the government's growing unpopularity.
Of course it is hard to credit this with much significance. The turnout in the election was abysmal.
Yesterday Mr Ndabeni-Ncube said the displacement of voters contributed to Saturday's low turnout of just 10.7 per cent. But the main reason for the poor showing was "the misery of the people" who felt their vote had become useless, he said.
What this does more than anything else is to highlight the hopelessness of the opposition to Mugabe.
Read it here.
And to make things worse:
BBC reports:
A herd of stray elephants has gone on the rampage in the northern Zimbabwean resort town of Kariba.
The elephants destroyed homes and caused residents to flee from a township near a national park.
Read it here.
Speculation as to why elephants and other animals are encroaching on human settlements includes long-term drought, and an animal population explosion. Either is bad news for Zimbabwe. Drought will exacerbate the already disastrous crop failures and too many elephants means overgrazing and environmental degradation.
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