There are many ways to steal an election, even if you don't have Diebold eating out of your hand. Good old-fashioned ballot-stuffing is still a reliable standby, no electronic hacking skills needed.
That appears to be what happened in Zimbabwe last month, according to the Sokwanele report.
On state television and radio the not-very-bright agents of the Electoral Commission had started to read out the initial results coming in from the constituencies. For each constituency, the number of votes cast and the number turned away was announced. Not yet the final tally for the parties, but just the total of votes cast. At one point the senior ZEC representative said that the results given represented the position at 7.30 p.m. — that is 30 minutes after the close of the polls. He got as far as reading out the results for 72 of the 120 constituencies when, inexplicably, he stopped — almost in mid sentence. No further results were ever again announced of votes cast. It is known that a message was relayed nationally over police radio ordering the announcement of the voting figures be stopped, immediately.
When election officials announced the final results, the numbers were grotesque. For instance,
In the Goromonzi constituency in Mashonaland East province, the electoral commission put turnout at 15,661 at 7.30pm but the declared results read out several hours later added up to 26,123 votes: Zanu-PF [Robert Mugabe's ruling party] recorded 16,782 — more than the announced number of voters.
Ballot-stuffing is but one tool in the arsenal of Mugabe's thugs. The Sokwanele report only only looked into the hours after the polls closed, but noted that the election had also been rigged with
...months of cynical scheming ... the manipulation of the food delivery system, and the cunning rewriting of the election laws, effectively to put Mugabe appointees in command, with the military to control it.
Here's the Guardian's take on the massive fraud.
Of course, there was a time, very recently, when Americans could take the high road in these matters and scoff under their breath about the political vagaries of banana republics. No more.
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