Western Countries Blocked from Observing Elections

Carla Neal/March, 7 2008 4:55pm/Democracy

This article focuses on the upcoming elections in Zimbabwe and the countries that are and are not allowed to monitor and/or observe them. The present president of Zimbabwe, Mugabe, and the foreign minister announce that representatives from many countries including Asian, African, and South American countries are invited to observe the elections; however, North America and Europe, with the exception of Russia, are not allowed to observe those same elections. They went on to state that the reason for this exclusion is because the countries in these two regions are extremely critical of the government’s methods and therefore are partial to the opposition and would not observe fairly. The minister went on to dispel the accusations of the opposition by stating that the opposition is just trying to “start something” because they know they will not win.

Some are saying that this tactic is a way for Mugabe to insure a win because the countries he is going to allow are not likely to criticize his methods no matter what they consist of; while others seem to believe this is being used to “create a racial divide by creating the impression that these countries are the only nations that consider elections to be rigged.” While we really don’t know his real motives for doing this is, I think it is pretty safe to say that Mugabe’s exclusion of these two areas because of the “criticism”, will only make people more suspicious of their motives and maybe make us more suspicious of election riggings which really does, in the end, support both of these theories.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200803070925.html