By all accounts, these were the freest elections held in Zimbabwe in more than two decades. But, as MDC representative for South Bulawayo Eddie Cross (who retained his seat) reports, there were clear irregularities. The street riots that took place in Harare last week were entirely understandable, given the historic bias of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC). This time, however, the ZEC appears to have discharged its duties with reasonable diligence. As Cross points out, there is a real chance Zimbabwe has swerved from the edge of the abyss and can now begin the arduous task of reconstruction after three decades of plunder under former President Robert Mugabe.

Zimbabwe's first post-Mugabe election looks like a neck-and-neck race between President Emmerson Mnangagwa's Zanu-PF and the MDC's Nelson Chamisa. MDC parliamenarian Eddie Cross looks at a numnber of potential outcomes, including the possibility of a coalition in the event there is no clear winner. We also look at Al Jazeera's coverage of the lead-up to the elections.

Cricket legend Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) won the country's recent election and promises a huge clean-up of corruption. What is also clear is that he plans a realignment with Pakistan's so-called ally, the US. He failed to win an outright majority, but will be able to secure control through a coalition with smaller regional parties.

Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa and the ruling Zanu-PF hope a credible victory in the July 30 election will legitimise the power (both party and state) they gained from the “soft coup” that toppled his predecessor Robert Mugabe last November, but a recent poll shows the opposition MDC closing the gap.

Things are hotting up ahead of Zimbabwe's 30 July poll which is expected to be a watershed event for the country. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is led by 40-year-old Nelson Chamisa, who faces off against the 75-year-old Emmerson Mnangagwa, formerly part of the Mugabe government before he desposed his one-time boss in a soft coup late last year. Stories are circulating in the Zimbabwean press that Chamisa has been in talks for Mugabe's wife, offering her a potential vice presidency should he win the race. Chamisa denies this. Voters are spoiled for choice of candiates, and the MDC appears to be contemplating the possibility of outright victory for the first time in its history (not counting the corrupt 2000 election which it undoubtedly won but had the result stolen by the ruling Zanu-PF). Not so fast, say Zimbabweans in SA. Chamisa may be young and charismatic, but he has not earned the trust of voters. If that's the case, could we see Mnangagwa pulling off yet another term for Zanu-PF? MDC parliamentarian from South Bulawayo, Eddie Cross, looks at what the new government has to confront, regardless of who wins.

It is now less than 30 days to Zimbabwe's election. MDC opposition parliamentarian Eddie Cross looks beyond the election result to the frightful challenge that awaits the winners, including the need to create jobs at the rate of 150,000 a year. The education and health budgets will have to double, but all of this will mean increased taxes. The old man Robert Mugabe might be gone, but his legacy is one of ruin. Whoever wins the election - and the opposition MDC is certainly in with a stronger than ever chance provided vote rigging is avoided - has a mountain to climb to pull the country back from the abyss.

With the recent news that compensation may finally be forthcoming for farmers whose properties have been compulsorily acquired by the Zimbabwe government since 2000, many of us now face a time of extremely painful memories and decisions, writes Cathy Buckle. 

On a stage in a park in Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital, Carl Joshua Ncube, perhaps the country’s most famous comedian, is coaching a novice. Imitating her act, in which she pretends to deliver a baby, he mimes a doctor slapping its bottom. “People love to hear about bottoms,” he tells her. An hour or so later, he introduces her — and three other wannabe female comics, one of whom is his wife—to a big audience. “In Zimbabwe we only have one female comedian,” he says, mock-solemnly. “We need some competition for Grace!” Feigning anxiety, he adds: “Although we know what happens when people try to introduce their wives to the profession!”

Oil prices spiked from around $40 to nearly $80 a barrel after US President Donald Trump announced last week he was pulling the US out of the Iran nuclear deal. Bibi Netanhayoo's signature is all over this. 

Zimbabwe's ruling party Zanu-PF appears to be falling apart with just 90 days to go before elections. President Emmerson Mnangagwa (pictured left), who was helped to power by a soft coup that removed his predecessor Robert Mugabe, is now facing challenges from the military in the form of Vice President Chiwenga. This does not look good for either the ruling party or the country. Some 50,000 business people have poured into Zimbabwe in recent months hoping for a change in the country's disastrous policy direction. MDC representative Eddie Cross explains what's going on.

Which country will the US invade next? US comedian and presenter of RT show "Redacted Tonight with Lee Camp" points out a few common threads linking all the countries that have fallen to a US regime that increasingly behaves like a rogue state. What joins Libya to Syria and Iran? Here's a clue: they all dumped the US dollar.

Hundreds of thousands of people poured onto the streets last month to mourn the passing of Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) founder and former leader, Morgan Tsvangirai. Just two months earlier one million Zimbabweans took to the streets to celebrate the ouster of former president Robert Mugabe, who will go down in history as a genocidal despot, alongside the like of Pol Pot and Josef Stalin. The MDC elected a new leader, Nelson Chamisa, 40 years old and an advocate, who carries the hopes of a younger generation of Zimbabweans into the up-coming elections. MDC MP Eddie Cross looks at how radically things have changed in Zimbabwe over the last few months.

If anything should put the fear of God into the West, it is the State of the Nation address given by Vladimir Putin earlier this week. He detailed a new generation of nuclear weaponry that is impervious to US or any other defence system. Putin prefaced his speech by saying Russia had been forced to revamp its military and offensive capability after the US and NATO had betrayed an agreement not to move an inch closer to the Russian border. The US now encircles Russia with military bases and holds hostile military exercises with earshot of Russia's borders. This is how Russia is responding, but this seems not to matter to the crazed neoconservatives in the US, who relish the idea of more wars and more military spending.

Former CIA chief James Woolsey appeared on Fox News to push the narrative of how dastardly 'dem Russkies' are in their meddling with the sacred soul of America's democracy. He also let slip that the US has been doing exactly the same to other countries. Zerohedge looks at the scorecard.

Morgan Tsvangirai passed away this week in South Africa after a long struggle with cancer. He brought hope to the people of Zimbabwe and should rightly have been president of the country had Robert Mugabe not stolen the elections from him and his party, the Movement for Democratic Change. Writing in The Conversation, David B. Moore, Professor of Development Studies, University of Johannesburg, looks at the life of this iconic leader and the opposition movement he led.

Zim president Emmerson Mnangagwa has inherited the military machine that his predecessor, Robert Mugabe, inherited from his predecessor Ian Smith. With seven months to elections, the new Zim cabinet cannot pretend that there is any residual love for Mugabe and his bootlickers. Opposition MP Eddie Cross recalls a lunch with Mugabe many years ago, and how Pol Pot's murderous Khymer Rouge served as a model for the new Zimbabwe. That legacy will be hard to shake off.    

Opposition Member of Parliament for Bulawayo, Eddie Cross, recalls a frightening encounter with the newly installed Zimbabwean president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, whose new cabinet includes some excellent choices and some dubious ones. "The Crocodile", as he is known, has a reputation for taking no prisoners. But Cross remains optimistic that Mnangagwa will deliver on promises of free and fair elections, and a radical transformation of the economy. His ministers have 100 days to deliver - or else.

Zimbabwe's former information minister Jonathan Moyo is smart, funny, always ready with a stinging quote to reduce his political opponnents to ash. According to Richard Chidza, he was also a political turncoat who jumped sides whenever it suited his own political survival. With the swearing in of new Zimbabwean president Emmerson Mnangagwa last week, Moyo is once again out in the cold. The diehard Mugabe supporters have lost their chief patron, and for some this is the end of their political careers. Some may end up in prison. Will Jonathan Moyo survive this time, as he has done so many times in the past?

Robert Mugabe, the former president of Zimbabwe, has been granted immunity from prosecution and a $10m lump sum golden handshake. In the view of many Zimbabweans, this is a small price to pay to get rid of the old man and his wife, Grace, who had ambitions of succeeding her husband. Now the hard reality sets in. The new president Emmerson Mnangagwa delivered an inauguration speech on Friday that sounded very much like the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) policy platform - re-engaging with the wider international community, tackling corruption, sorting out the thorny land reform issue (and whether and what to pay white farmers who were dispossessed without compensation). In this article, MDC representative Eddie Cross spells out the challenges that lie ahead. The optimism of Zimbabweans has never reached such heights. Will it be short-lived?  

Zim opposition member of parliament Eddie Cross reports on the events of the last few days, culminating in the resignation/removal of Robert Mugabe and his coterie of "criminals" from power. There is a palpable sense of freedom in the country, but we should be modest in our expectations. Zanu-PF has signalled its intention to go it alone in government, without inviting opposition parties to the table. A million people gathered on thre streets of Harare in the last few days to bid the old man good riddance. The genie of freedom has been uncorked and will not go back in the bottle. Long-suffering Zimbabweans are in no mood to entertain another dictator dressed up as a saviour, if that is what Mugabe's successor Emmerson Mnangagwa has in mind. These are interesting days indeed.

Zimbabwe opposition member of parliament Eddie Cross reported a week ago that the era of Robert Mugabe was coming to an end. Little did he know just how prescient that prediction was. A few days later the army had taken over in a soft coup and placed Mugabe and his family in "protective custody". The old man refused to go, but it now seems he has no say in the matter. As Eddie Cross argues in this article, the fired vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa is likely to lead a transitional government, which will have to act quickly to restore credibility to the country. This means opposition members may be included in any interim cabinet. We also find out from Cross that Mnangagwa has a history of human rights abuses, but is not known particularly for corruption.

A week ago Eddie Cross, an opposition member of parliament in Zimbabwe, predicted that the end of Robert Mugabe's reign in Zimbabwe. In this article he outlines the forces at work in that troubled country, as the military takes control of the political structures and holds the 93 year-old president under virtual house arrest while ostensibly battling "criminal elements" trying to sieze control. Who will replace Mugabe? Enter Emmerson Mnangagwa, fired last week by Mugabe and now invited back to the country. Or, as Eddie Cross suggests, will this open the door to free and fair elections next year? 

Reports from Zimbabwe this morning say the army has arrested several cabinet ministers and there are unconfirmed reports that President Robert Mugabe and his family are under virtual house arrest in Borrowdale, a suburb of Harare. The official opposition ambassador to SA, Austin Moyo, says all indications are that Zimbabwe is headed to military rule.

Zimbabwe's first lady Grace Mugabe bolted back to Harare after somehow gaining diplomatic immunity after assaulting model Gabriella Engels at the Sandton residence of the two sons, Robert Junior and Chatunga. The two spoiled brats are under-achievers and troublemakers of note, but have cultivated a taste for the finer things of life. Afriforum private prosecutor Gerrie Nel - the man who put Oscar Pistorius in prison for shooting his girlfriend - says Grace may have fled the country but justice will be done for Gabriella. It's safe to assume Grace may have made her last visit to SA. 

The fate of every living thing on this planet rests on 1970s IBM computer technology using 8 inch floppy drives, reports The Guardian. That's the technology being used to run the US nuclear arsenal, leading some to speculate that a small mistake on these museum-ready computers could trigger an all-out nuclear holocaust. Alternatively, that when it comes to actually pulling the trigger, the US nuclear arsenal will simply fail. So where exactly is the US spending its $1 trillion annual military budget?