Zimbabwe election results live: Mnangagwa LEADS as preliminary results come in | World | News

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The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission reported in its preliminary results that  Mr Mnangagwa’s party has won has won the majority seats in parliament, showing he picked up 109 seats against 41 for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

Mr Mnangagwa is the leader of the Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZAN-PF) and has secured the party’s rule over the country.

The ZEC reported this morning there was a turnout of 60 to78 percent in some areas.

Final results will be announced by August 4, but today’s result is a good indication of who will be leading the country.

It is the first election in 38 years that ousted 94-year-old Robert Mugabe’s name was not on the ballot.

Mr Mnangagwa was Mr Mugabe’s successor and took over after he was ousted in a bloodless coup in November.

The leader of the ZANU-PF party went against Mr Chamisa, a lawyer and pastor.

The day before citizens went to the polls, Mr Mugabe announced he would vote for MDC and against his own party.

In a rambling off-the-cuff speech that lasted almost an hour a frail-looking Mugabe said: “I hope the choice of voting tomorrow will throw, thrust away the military government and bring us back to constitutionality.

“I said I can’t vote for those who have caused me to be in this situation, so there is Chamisa left.”

Several civil society groups that were collating results from 10,985 polling posts in parallel with ZEC this morning but were not allowed to release results before the ZEC.

A source at one group said it was looking “very close”.

The winner of this landmark election will be tasked with putting Zimbabwe back on track after 37 years of Mr Mugabe’s rule.

His rule was tainted by corruption, mismanagement and diplomatic isolation.

There needs to be a credible vote if the country is to secure donor funding and foreign investment.

Even though more than 20 candidates stood for election it was clearly a race between Mr Mnangagwa, who was seen as a front-runner, and Mr Chamisa.

This morning both candidates were confident what today’s results was going be.

Mr Mnangagwa tweeted: “Good morning Zimbabwe. I am delighted by the high turnout and citizen engagement so far.

“The information from our reps on the ground is extremely positive! Waiting patiently for official results as per the constitution.”

Mr Chamisa also tweeted: “Winning resoundingly…We now have results from the majority of the over 10 000 polling stations. We’ve done exceedingly well.

“Awaiting ZEC to perform their constitutional duty to officially announce the people’s election results and we are ready to form the next government.”

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