Zimbabweans will risk their lives for change, says church official

Published: 2008-04-04

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) -- Zimbabweans will risk their lives for change if they need to, a church official said nearly a week after the presidential election, when results still had not been announced. Even if President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party uses violent intimidation in a possible second-round runoff, "I think people will say enough is enough, whatever happens to us, let us vote for change," Alouis Chaumba, head of Zimbabwe's Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, said in an April 4 telephone interview from the nation's capital, Harare. "People are now prepared to sacrifice their lives for the future of their children and the future of Zimbabwe," Chaumba said. "They won't abandon their hopes for a new chance," he said. Zimbabwe's combined opposition has won a majority in parliament, defeating ZANU-PF, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission said April 2. No official numbers were released in the presidential vote, in which a candidate needs 50 percent plus one vote to avoid a runoff. Zimbabwe's main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, says that its leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, has won presidential elections outright with 50.3 percent of the vote.

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