I read on ZWNews today that Zimbabwe police yesterday harassed three journalists, including Jan Raath and Angus Shaw. As my mum is a journalist in Zimbabwe, I have known these two men since I was a kid, when they could often be found on a Sunday afternoon on our verandah, talking politics with the other assembled hacks, enjoying a braai, and drinking copious amounts of Castle Beer and Royal Cask whisky (of which I think a more accurate description is found in smaller letters on the label: “whisky flavoured spirit”).

The three journalists were accused by Zimbabwean police of being spies. Spying is obviously a current preoccupation of Mugabe’s, and points to a paranoia which so often afflicts ageing, deluded, megalomaniac revolutionaries-turned-dictators. In December, five prominent Zimbabweans who were either senior members of, or had strong links to, his ruling Zanu-PF party, were arrested for being part of an espionage ring sending secrets to South Africa. Whereas this earlier case is based on some evidence, and on admissions of guilt by three of the five (which they claim were extracted under duress – and having heard first-hand accounts of experiences in Zimbabwean cells, this is a highly probable claim), the case against the journalists is clearly complete fabrication. The police soon left their offices, saying there was no evidence of espionage. Within an hour, more police had arrived, this time questioning the three about their accreditation status. The press has been increasingly quelled in Zimbabwe in recent years, and under laws put in place in 2002 by the then Minister of Information Jonathan Moyo, it became illegal to work as a journalist without specific clearance from the state-run Media and Information Commission. Interestingly. Moyo was also sidelined out of the party in the same purge which saw the espionage ring’s arrest in December.

As the journalists have applied for accreditation, even though they have not had their applications passed, under the law they can remain working until such a time as they are explicitly rejected. So it looks like they will not be arrested, but, as their lawyer, the brave and tireless Beatrice Mtetwa, states, “It’s harassment. Police came to their office with three different sets of allegations, so it’s obvious they don’t know what to charge them with. They [police] are looking for a reason to lock them up.” A few hours before, in the middle of the night, Jan had also been subjected to a car driving up to his home, and the men inside it trying to force the gates open, a well known scare tactic of the secret police, the Central Intelligence Organisation.

I have found out that the men were advised not to stay at home last night, and also that when friends tried to contact him, Jan was fine, had had a few drinks, and was less than coherent. On the surface it is an incident which has passed off with no repercussion – no arrests, no expulsion (as in the case of Andy Meldrum a few years ago), no torture or murder (so commonly the outcome of being targeted by the police in Zimbabwe). But the worrying thing about this story links back to the fact that it is so clearly harassment. Zanu-PF is currently gearing up for the March 31st elections. Their campaign is completely shambolic: internally, Mugabe’s credibility should have plummeted when he launched the campaign on Friday with no manifesto (the writing of which was previously the remit of Jonathan Moyo, the sidelined information Minister!), saying that it was ‘not quite ready’; externally, he will have made no friends when his response to Condoleezza Rice having named him a tyrant was to call her ‘a girl born out of slave ancestry’ who should know “that the white man is not a friend”.

And yet despite their disorganisation Mugabe is set to win the election because none of the issues which were supposed to have been addressed to ensure that it will be free and fair, have been. The MDC is contesting the election reluctantly, because they want to give their supporters a chance to participate in the elections, and to “keep the flame of hope for change alive”. Among the concerns they have are the following:

Rule of law concerns have not been addressed; The media remains muzzled; Free assembly is proscribed by the Public Order Security Act; The recently appointed Electoral Commission is yet to prove its independence; The shambolic voter’s roll continues to be the principal vehicle for electoral fraud; The Constituency boundaries have been subjectively gerrymandered whilst militias and militia bases continue to multiply; International observers continue to be unwelcome.

So, little has changed since the last election, and yet Mugabe is set to get away with it again, and, like that other re-elected leader we all love, he will claim that this time there were no irregularities. And either because he has convinced the world that he has carried out electoral reform, or because we don’t really care about a country so far away, it looks like we’re all going to swallow it. And how much easier this will be for him if he does manage to remove or silence the last journalists currently getting news out of the country ahead of the election date.