Mugabe Loses Parliament in Zimbabwe

A man repairing a bicycle tire sat next to torn posters of President Robert G. Mugabe in Harare, Zimbabwe on Wednesday (thanks Desmond of AFP).

Emmanuel Chitate/Reuters - Zimbabweans in Umguza listened Tuesday for news. After three days, no results had been announced in the presidential election.

Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP = Morgan Tsvangirai, who appears to be leading in Zimbabwe’s presidential election, speaking to reporters in Harare on Tuesday.

Philimon Bulawayo/Reuters - President Robert G. Mugabe of Zimbabwe in March.

HARARE, Zimbabwe — President Robert G. Mugabe and his ruling party have lost control of the nation’s Parliament, election returns showed on Wednesday, giving new impetus to the bigger question: Does that foretell a loss of the presidency itself, the job he has held tightly for the past 28 years?

As this nation waited in frustration a fourth day without official results in its presidential race, the main opposition party of Morgan Tsvangirai announced its own final tally, proclaiming victory with 50.3 percent of the vote to Mr. Mugabe’s 43.8 percent — just barely enough to avoid a runoff. Zimbabwe now waits to see if the official count matches the opposition’s, knowing it would not require a very heavy thumb on the scale to force another round of voting three weeks from now.

There were signs that Mr. Mugabe has endorsed a second vote, which, while not as humiliating as an outright defeat, would still seem a difficult pill for a man who has held power for 28 years and considers himself the father of the nation. Wednesday morning’s edition of The Herald, the state-run newspaper, reported that “the pattern of results” shows that no candidates “will garner more than 50 percent of the vote, forcing a re-run.”

The newspaper, considered a mouthpiece for Mr. Mugabe, published no actual election totals from Saturday’s vote and attributed its conclusion to analysts. But it likely means that ruling party insiders have urged the president not to give up his — and their — power, either convincing Mr. Mugabe to keep on fighting or at least to maintain the option.

Even so, the election commission confirmed Wednesday that the balance of power had fatefully shifted in Parliament, long a bastion of support for Mr. Mugabe. With only 11 races to be declared, the Movement for Democratic Change, the opposition party, had 106 seats in all, including one for an allied independent, in the 210-seat assembly. Mr. Mugabe’s party — known as ZANU-PF — had only 93 seats and among its losing candidates were seven of the president’s cabinet ministers.

But the presidency remains another matter. A businessman with close connections to the party hierarchy, speaking only on condition of anonymity, said the president had met Tuesday evening first with the chiefs of military and intelligence and then with key members of his cabinet and the party presidium. “They urged him to go to the bush,” the businessman said, meaning that in a runoff the party would employ tactics of intimidation and bloodshed that had worked well in earlier campaigns, especially in rural areas that can be closed off to opposition candidates.