elections

Horns blaring, the motorcade sweeps past us near Manica, twenty miles from Mozambique's border with Zimbabwe. An outrider on a motorcycle forces our vehicle off the road in this desolate countryside, flanked by the Amatonga hills. Youths hang out of open lorries: some wear election posters for Mozambique's ruling FRELIMO party on their backs and their chests, like paper ponchos. Black SUVs carry smartly-dressed women in elaborate turbans. Official campaigning for Mozambique's October 28 general elections kicked off this weekend. After eight years watching elections in crisis-riddled Zimbabwe, the torn election posters lying in a marshy township in the seaside port of Beira look fairly familiar. Political analysts say President Armando Guebuza is almost certain to be returned to power. His FRELIMO party has been in power here since independence in 1975: Zimbabwe's ZANU-PF has been in power since 1980. Despite the grey landscape -- the rumour is that if you paint your outside, you have to pay more tax -- there is an optimistic vibe. Villages are dotted with the bright yellow and blue shacks of rival mobile 'phone companies. "Tudobom", one advertisement reads: "Everything's fine." Part of the centre of the market town of Chimoio have been cordoned off. Policemen in white shirts stand at the side of the square, I'm immediately cautious. In Zimbabwe, policemen at ruling party rallies do not like white Western journalists. Neither do party officials: just before one poll, I ran into a glaring (now former) agriculture minister Joseph Made at a thatched tea-room near Headlands, near where he'd been addressing a rally. "Hey, camarado," one officer shouts, waving. "Good morning."