Robert Mugabe, the President of Zimbabwe, has just written another chapter in history’s instruction manual on rigging elections for dictators. With Zimbabwe’s March 31st parliamentary elections, in which those considering a vote against Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party were beaten, imprisoned, or threatened starvation, Mugabe has shown the world’s up-and-coming autocrats how to make a mockery of democracy but still keep the good will of the United Nations and Kofi Annan: first get a seat on the UN’s Human Rights Commission, then abuse your people’s rights with impunity.

According to state-reported election results, Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party won 78 of parliament’s 120 elected seats. The only viable opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), won 41 seats, and 1 seat went to an independent candidate. As president, Mugabe has the power to appoint 30 additional parliamentary seats. These numbers give Mugabe the two-thirds majority necessary to amend the constitution and push through legislative reforms which would extend his grip on power.

On April 3rd, he expressed intent to expand parliament to around 200 members and create a new upper parliamentary chamber which would no doubt be packed with political allies. Critics speculate that Mugabe would use such power to amend the constitution to allow him to name a successor upon retirement, bypassing the current requirement to hold presidential elections.

An examination of the numerous accounts of fraud, intimidation, and coercion associated with the election reveals a citizenry suffering under years of government mismanagement, yet largely silenced by fear.

Under Zimbabwe’s current draconian security laws, it is a miracle that the MDC has been visible at all in the period leading up to the elections. Any attempted “coercion” of the government, even peaceful protesting, can result in up to a 20-year jail term, and any political gathering of more than three people requires police permission. In the term leading up to the election, Human Rights Watch reported dozens of cases of MDC supporters who were beaten, kidnapped, or harassed by members of Mugabe’s police and the ZANU political party. Hundreds of journalists and civilians have been arrested for unspecified “political crimes.” The government has shut down nearly all independently-run newspapers, including the nation’s most prominent, the Daily News.

On the day of elections, government soldiers and ZANU party agents ran more than 8000 polling stations spread out across the country, and also tallied the results. Mugabe barred all but the most sympathetic political organizations from sending election observers. The Zimbabwe Election Support Network, an independent organization which managed to deploy 6000 observers nationwide, reported that as many as 25% of prospective voters were turned away at the polls because they didn’t appear on the voter roll or failed to present proper identification. The government’s voter roll itself is highly suspicious. A partial audit of the roll by the MDC in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second-largest city, shows that barely half of the names were listed correctly, and almost a fifth of those listed are dead. Over the last four years, ZANU politicians have also gerrymandered constituency boundaries to minimize the voting power of MDC-supportive regions.

In response to international pressure, Mugabe held down excessively violent attacks on MDC supporters in the weeks before the election, but the government still employed shameless scare tactics to coerce citizens into voting for the ZANU. Rural voters were widely told that ZANU agents would know who they voted for by looking through new transparent ballot boxes, and that anyone who voted for the MDC would receive no food aid after the election. For many on the brink of starvation, such a punishment would be tantamount to a death sentence. In downtown Harare (the nation’s capital), 250 women who had gathered peacefully to pray for divine intervention against the fraudulent elections were arrested. According to Amnesty International, some were beaten and severely injured before the government released them.

After the elections, although police were extensively deployed throughout Harare to prevent protests, indignant groups of MDC supporters still managed to gather to decry the fraudulent results. Meanwhile, MDC officials have been busy collecting evidence against the government to contest the results in court. So far, across 30 of the electoral races, 183,000 ballots are unaccounted for. Mugabe and the governments of some neighboring countries continue to insist that the elections were free and fair.

Though evidence against the government seems overwhelming, Zimbabweans hoping for freedom will be left to fight alone. Similar complaints lodged against even more blatantly fraudulent 2000 parliamentary elections have yet to be heard by a single court. These citizens need the decisive support of the international community to win the political freedom they deserve.

In April 4th statements, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan stopped far short of calling the government on its fraud, simply offering the feeble observation that the opposition is very unhappy with election conditions which they “consider” unfair. To uncover the reason for his baffling ambiguity one need only look as far as the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, where Zimbabwe has happily held a position since 2003.

After watching Mr. Annan cave in for nearly identical reasons in dealing with the Darfur genocide, his behavior is becoming numbingly predictable. If Robert Mugabe gets credit for the latest chapter in history’s “How To” manual for dictators, Kofi Annan belongs with Neville Chamberlain in the chapter on “How to Cultivate Appeasers.”