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Mounting violence in Zimbabwe’s Bikita West constituency has “severely compromised” by-election campaigning by the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), party spokesman Learnmore Jongwe told IRIN on Wednesday.
He confirmed press reports that MDC candidate Bonnie Pokayi had been forced to stop campaigning in the vacant rural seat. “The situation is so bad you can hardly walk there and claim to be MDC,” Jongwe said. “We are now trying to see if we can have other means of low-key campaigning.”
One person has already died in the political violence. Both the ruling ZANU-PF and the MDC claim that the man, who was stabbed at a ZANU-PF rally at the weekend, was one of their supporters. Next week’s by-election is viewed by the two parties as a gauge of their support in the politically important rural areas ahead of presidential elections next year.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions