Mugabe's party to challenge Zimbabwe election results

The party's politburo also endorsed Mugabe to fight opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai in a runoff for the presidency. Although opposition officials say they believe Tsvangirai won the election, they say they will participate in a runoff if official results indicate he received less than the required 50% plus one vote.

The ZANU-PF strategy, according to sources close to the party, is to delay a second round of voting beyond the required 21 days to 90 days. Many fear that such a move would result in violence and intimidation as was seen in previous elections, when opposition activists were beaten, harassed and sometimes killed.

Although many ruling party figures are concerned that Mugabe's support could decline further in the second round of voting, as people sense his power waning, hard-liners are hoping he will emerge victorious. He would then be in a position to pick his successor.

The voting last weekend confounded predictions: analysts and diplomats expected Mugabe to win narrowly because of gerrymandering and his control of the state media and government machinery. But Zimbabweans fed up with a 100,000% inflation rate, 80% unemployment, economic collapse and poverty, repudiated the ruling party, which lost its parliamentary majority for the first time in its 28 years in power.

Independent projections by the Zimbabwe Election Support Network, based on a 5% voting sample, slated Mugabe to lose the presidential ballot and predicted a runoff. Official results are not expected for several days.

Even with Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, poised in the wings and intense pressure from southern African countries on Mugabe to accept the results, ruling party supporters have balked at going quietly.

Many Mugabe backers loathe Tsvangirai and are contemptuous of his lack of liberation war credentials. More than anything, they fear losing their farms, businesses and trappings of power accumulated since Mugabe took office in 1980. Many Mugabe supporters also fear prosecution for past crimes.

After the deeply flawed elections in 2002 and 2005, the opposition failed to mobilize sustained street protests in the face of violent reprisals by authorities.