Is this the beginning of the end for Mugabe, or is it going to be a repeat of the last election? Apparently the Election Commission has started to release results, with the MDC winning half of the small number of seats called so far. Given the extraordinary delay, I'd be amazed if Mugabe lets the MDC win - as the saying goes, if you're going to rig an election, make sure you win it. That said, the margin of victory being reported for the MDC by observers is large enough that it would be impossible to rig it plausibly. And it seems that the dire economic situation has had more effect on people this time than Zanu-PF's corruption and violence last time, so even if he does overturn the result, there's more chance of a general revolt. Let's hope it doesn't come to that, but I really don't see Mugabe and his goons relinquising power without a fight.

Does anyone know where to find the best reporting on Zimbabwe at the moment? And, G-Man, what do you think South Africa's response is going to be? Can they really continue to look the other way?

Other than justifiable hatred of Mugabe, what else are the MDC running on, policy-wise? One of the things that annoys me about coverage of this sort of stuff is that you never really get much of a sense of other politics. Though given how appallingly journalists are treated in Zimbabwe, it's not surprising that a lot of stories don't get out.

The results that give the MDC such a healthy lead have come mostly from the urban areas, which a MDC strongholds. I think a true picture of the counted results (including stuffed ballots and the usual shenanigans) will become apparent when the rural areas, Mugabe's stronghold, are all in.

I'm not sure I like Tsvangirai much better, to be honest. Best case scenario, in my view, is that the vote is split in such a way that it will be clear to everybody that a unity government is the way to go. Let Mugabe serve with reduced influence for two years, and then let Tsvangirai or another MDC person be president till the next election.

SA's response wll hinge on the electoral observers, I think. If they declare the poll "substanially free and fair" — and after SA's and the SADC's observers did so last time around, they'll have more reason to do so this time around — then Mbeki will see himself bound by the results. He will have to back whatever mandate emerges from the polls. The closer the results, the more he'll agitate for a coalition, especially if the results return Mugabe marginally and against the MDC's justifiable claims of vote rigging (on TV last night they showed one solitary shack in a field at which 9,000 voters are registered).

It would be an absolutely stunning result if the MDC wins this election, especially given all the onstacles it faced. But the SA government won't want Tsvangirai and the MDC in charge alone, and with good reason. Within the MDC, Tsvangirai has already shown dictatorial and self-aggrandising traits, and the two MDC factions make for very uneasy bedfellows. Add to that the inexperience of its leaders in an evironment where the police and army have declared their loyalty to Mugabe, and you have a very unstable situation.

So I think the diplomatic effort will concentrate on ways to ease Mugabe into retirement, and try to introduce a sense of political stability. I should imagine that Britain, the EU and the US will be asked to give material backing for Zim's reconstruction efforts. I think that will happen anyway to curb Chinese influence in the region.

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Other than justifiable hatred of Mugabe, what else are the MDC running on, policy-wise?

At the moment they need no policies; the priority is to get rid of Mugabe. Which is one of the reasons why an MDC-only government is indesirable.

Tsvangirai has talked about giving farms back to their previous owners, and he'd doubtless do away with stuff like the price control law and the indigenisation of big business. But I doubt he has an idea about how to fix the below-the-abyss economic conditions, or how to control the security forces. He'd need Zanu-PF (preferably purged of hardline Mugabe proxies).

Another thought on SA's response: the trade union movemrnt COSATU, which is in an alliance with the ANC, is outspokenly anti-Mugabe. COSATU was instrumental in getting Jacob Zuma elected ANC president. Chances are that Mbeki's room to manoeuvre on Zimbabwe will be very limited, and that he'll have to take the lead from ANC policy, as designed by Zuma's backers.

The Graun is reporting that independent observers say the MDC won even in places like Mashonaland, which really surprised me despite the economic context. But it's impossible to tell who those observers are and if they're really independent.

E10, I agree it's very frustrating, but at the same time inevitable. Given that they're clearly the only viable opposition, apart from this breakaway Zanu-PF guy, their policies become almost irrelevant, especially from an outsiders' perspective. It does of course create a very real risk of installing another dodgy government, but I have to say the situation in Zimbabwe is so horrific that pretty much any functioning government would be an improvement.

But can the MDC run a functioning government? They can't even run a functioning party.

The breakaway fellow, Simba Makoni, would have been the better option. I hope that for his kindness of splitting the Zanu-PF vote the MDC will include him in their putative government.

If only he wouldn't go on and on about spacehoppers and Boney M.

I don't really know anything about the splitter, but if he was willing to stick with Zanu-PF for that long, I doubt he's the kind of person you'd want running the country on his own. It's not like they became vicious, economically incompetent fuckers overnight.

Price controls don't work do they? They just stop farmers producing food. (Or in the CAP case encourage them to produce too much)

So I think removing price controls will do more than anything to restore the economy and re-build agricultural production needed to feed people and put some money into the country.

If Mugabe goes, I think out of sheer necessity some sort of World Bank programme will be needed to stabilise Zimbabwe. There will also need to be emergency social provision for those at the very bottom.

It will be a painful transition and the people will need our support.

I can almost smell the hypocrisy already from the conservative elements who have Zimbabwe in their hearts, but looking to ditch it as soon as Tsvangirai gets elected.

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I don't really know anything about the splitter, but if he was willing to stick with Zanu-PF for that long, I doubt he's the kind of person you'd want running the country on his own. It's not like they became vicious, economically incompetent fuckers overnight.

Yes and no. I don't think that everybody in Zanu-PF is intrinsically a person of dubious character (though many or most certainly are). It's in part that whole loyalty to the liberation movement thing which may yet fuck over South Africa.

As for Makoni himself, he has a long history of dissent within and before that outside Zanu-PF. I don't quite understand how he was ever in a position to become government minister with his track record of dissent.

Isn't the electoral conflict at least partly ethnic? The majority (80%) Shona, minority Ndebele and less than 1% Whites. MDC is not organised on ethnic lines AFAIK.

My knowledge of the African continent is sorely lacking, so apologies if this comes across as a spectacularly dim question. But, what is the most stable, uncorrupt, (perhaps) prosperous nation in Africa? I mean, I'd think SA. But if so, who's next. I used to think Kenya had its shit together, and now it's all gone pear shaped. Is there a stable, reliable and trustworthy democracy in the lot?

Botswana is the best I can think of. The ruling party there is utterly dominant, but that is because it governs well and benevolently.

What's the situation in SA? I keep hearing about very high crime rates in the major cities.

Yeah, crime is a really serious problem, especially in the townships.

Government corruption is disheartening as well. ANC president Jacob Zuma is going on trial in August; and the whispers are getting louder that Thabo Mbeki's vest is less than white concerning a highly controversial arms deal a decade ago (corruption associated with that deal forms part of the Zuma charge sheet, and saw former ANC chief-whip Tony Yengeni jailed).

There is also unease over the ANC's increasing lack of respect for democratic principles, even as it is itself internally very democratic. But laws mucking about with press freedoms are worrying. The ANC also sees itself as increasingly as synonymous with the state, which is never a god sign.

For example, the political editors at the state-owned are deployed ANC cadres who make no secret of their bias. And that bias shows. The ANC finds that bias controversial only when it found expression in the Mbeki vs Zuma contest for the ANC presidency.

Then there is the ANC's sudden urge to close down South Africa's equivalent of the FBI, which has done a great job. But it has made enemies by charging Zuma and the corrupt (allegedly, he sighed) police commissioner -- and till recently ceremonial head of Interpol -- Jackie Selebi, a Mbeki ally. The ANC has made no good case for closing it. The conclusions are easy to reach.

Then we have a huge energy crisis, which can be blamed on lack of foresight by the government, and which set our economy back by years, even decades. Poverty is not being solved. Housing shortages remain. There is no solution in sight to the HIV/Aids crisis.

On the plus side, we have a functioning judiciary, a fantastic Constitution, English football on pay TV, and good weather.

At the risk of diverting this thread towards SA, is there a case, now, that it would be best for the ANC to split? Perhaps with the left part of it, and the unions, in one party, and others more 'centrist' in another. I appreciate that using left-right faultlines like this might not be the easiest way of untangling this, but indulge me from my position of relative ignorance. It'd at least be a way of politics moving beyond the liberators-turned-ossified-elite process that hasn't happened so often. (And not just in Africa, a similar process could be said to have happened in Ireland, a place sorely in need of proper - and dare I say it, class - politics.

I mean who do you sort of rally round/vote for these days, G?