By MacDonald Dzirutwe
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe police arrested the oppositionMDC's secretary general as he flew in on Thursday ahead of aJune 27 presidential run-off vote and detained party leaderMorgan Tsvangirai for the third time this month.
The opposition and human rights groups accuse PresidentRobert Mugabe's government of waging a campaign of arrests andviolent intimidation ahead of the run-off against Tsvangirai.
MDC officials said party secretary general Tendai Biti wasdetained as he stepped off a plane at Harare airport. Biti, theparty's number three, left the country soon after disputedMarch 29 elections to gather African support.
Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said Biti had beenarrested over the opposition's early announcement of resultsfrom the elections.
"He was wanted in connection with the prematureannouncement of results before the official announcement ofresults by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission," he said.
Chris Mhike, a lawyer acting for the MDC, said an urgentcourt application would be made to force authorities to bringBiti to court as soon as possible.
Tsvangirai was detained at a roadblock on his way toaddress a campaign rally on Thursday, the party said. He wasdetained by police twice last week and held for several hourson both occasions.
POLITICAL VIOLENCE
Tsvangirai beat Mugabe in the first round of elections inMarch but not by enough to avoid a run-off, according toofficial figures.
The MDC says ZANU-PF activists have killed 66 oppositionsupporters to try to intimidate voters before the run-off, andpolice have detained Tsvangirai twice over the past week whiletrying to campaign.
The ruling party blames the opposition for the politicalviolence.
Observers from southern African regional body SADC saidmonitoring the elections would be a big challenge. Monitorsfrom Western countries critical of Mugabe will not be allowed.
"It is a mammoth task," SADC official Tanki Mothae saidbefore the deployment of 120 observers out of 400.
Mothae said the SADC wanted to help Zimbabwe run a free andfair poll: "This is to help the people of Zimbabwe go throughthis election as peacefully as possible."
Mugabe's support has been eroded by the economic collapseof the once prosperous country, which he has ruled sinceindependence from Britain in 1980.
Mugabe has conceded that beneficiaries of his controversialfarm seizures are using less than half the land and threatenedto take it off them, state media said on Thursday.
Critics say the veteran leader has used the land reforms tohelp sustain his rule, rewarding supporters with fertile farmsseized from whites -- although many are ill-equipped toproperly engage in agriculture.
The official Herald newspaper quoted Mugabe as saying only42 percent of the land was under full use and renewing threatsto re-possess farms that were not being properly used in acountry suffering food shortages and economic collapse.
(Additional reporting by Cris Chinaka; Editing by MatthewTostevin)
