Zimbabwe police chief threatens use of firearms

(CNN) -- Police in Zimbabwe will not hesitate to use their guns to quell violence during and after next month's elections, the official media reported Wednesday.

Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri issued the stern warning in a press conference in Harare, where he also took swipes at the United States and Great Britain.

"We are not deterred by the utterances of hate from the Western world concerning this issue," Chihuri was quoted as saying in the Herald newspaper.

"I reiterate that the police will never treat perpetrators of political violence with kid gloves."

Zimbabwe's longtime president, Robert Mugabe, could face the most serious challenges to his decades-long rule, in the March 29 presidential and parliamentary elections.

Mugabe, 84, has been the country's only ruler since it achieved independence from Britain 28 years ago.

Chihuri said police will "never allow" Kenya-style riots to break out in the streets of Zimbabwe if the election results do not favor any particular political party.

At least 1,000 people were killed in bloody ethnic battles after Kenya's December 27 vote, amid accusations of vote rigging.

"It is time for political parties to own up when they lose," Chihuri said. "Machetes, axes, bows and arrows cannot put anybody into office. We will never allow that to happen in this country."

Mugabe is facing two formidable opponents: a heavyweight within his own party and a leading opposition figure.

Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai this month that he and his party will participate in the elections.

Mugabe survived a hotly contested presidential challenge from Tsvangirai in 2002, amid widespread accusations of vote rigging.

Last March, the government cracked down against the MDC, raiding the party's Harare headquarters, detaining and beating MDC members -- including Tsvangirai -- and preventing others from leaving the country.

Mugabe's government accuses the MDC for using brutal tactics to oppose the government.

Tsvangirai has rejected any possibility of teaming up with Mugabe's other challenger, former Finance Minister Simba Makoni, who recently announced his bid to unseat Mugabe and was promptly booted out of the ruling ZANU-PF party.

Chihuri said that, like opposition groups, Western countries have already started hinting that the elections this go round could be compromised as well.

"The same thread of rhetoric is also coming from the U.S. and Britain whose hypothesis is that any victory by a ruling party in Africa (means) the elections are not free and fair," he said. "They are already making these insinuations because they fear the victory of the ruling party."

Under Mugabe's rule, once-prosperous Zimbabwe has suffered an economic crisis, with routine shortages of food, electricity and foreign currency.

The most recent estimate of the nation's inflation rate said it exceed 24,000 percent, but economists say it is much higher.

While there is no official figure, unemployment among Zimbabweans is estimated at 80 percent. E-mail to a friend

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