Opposition loses legal battle in poll case

Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) lost a third legal battle on Wednesday in its bid to have the courts nullify the outcome of 37 constituencies in last year’s parliamentary elections, news reports said. MDC spokesman Learnmore Jongwe was quoted as saying that his party was still waiting for a copy of the ruling in the latest case, but that High Court Judge Paddington Garwe had issued his ruling that ZANU-PF candidate Phillip Chiyangwa had legitimately won the Chinhoyi electoral district. The latest ruling is the third loss for the MDC which has won three cases while three have been dropped. The MDC had accused Chiyangwa of vote-buying saying that he had run advertisements urging people to vote for him in exchange for money.