Zimbabwean President, Emerson Mnangagwa has been declared winner of Wednesday’s polls by the country’s electoral commission.
Mnangagwa won with over 52% of the vote with his main challenger, Nelson Chamisa of the Citizens’ Coalition for Change, CCC securing 44%.
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An opposition spokesperson in a post on X, formerly Twitter, insisted that the party rejected “any result hastily assembled without verification”.
Mnangagwa narrowly defeated Chamisa at the last presidential polls in 2018, an election the opposition alleged was rigged. The constitutional court however upheld that result.
Mnangagwa took over from long-time leader, Robert Mugabe after a 2017 army coup and was widely expected to secure re-election as analysts said the contest was skewed in favour of the ruling party. His party, the ZANU-PF party has been in power for more than four decades.
The head of the European Union’s observer mission had said the election took place in a “climate of fear” while Southern African regional bloc SADC’s mission noted issues including voting delays, the banning of rallies and biased state media coverage.
(Addition information from Reuters)
Editor: Terverr Tyav
