Zimbabwe’s Movement for Democratic Change said yesterday it could take to the streets to challenge President Robert Mugabe’s victory in elections it rejects as a farce and face scepticism from the West.

No results of the presidential vote on July 31 have been announced. But Mugabe’s Zanu-PF has already claimed a resounding win and interim tallies of the parliamentary count suggest a huge victory for the 89-year-old, Africa’s oldest President, who has ruled since independence from Britain in 1980.

While the African Union’s monitoring mission chief called Wednesday’s peaceful polls generally “free and fair” – Western observers were kept out by Harare – domestic monitors have described them as “seriously compromised” by registration flaws that may have disenfranchised up to a million people.

Observers from the Southern African Development Community, a regional group, described the elections as “free and peaceful” and urged Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai to accept the result.

Tsvangirai, who faces political annihilation in his third attempt to oust Mugabe at the ballot box, has already denounced the vote as a “huge farce” marred by polling day irregularities and intimidation by Zanu-PF.

The mood on the streets of the capital Harare was subdued on Friday as the MDC leadership met to chart the next move, with everything from a legal challenge to street protests on the table.

“Demonstrations and mass action are options,” party spokesman Douglas Mwonzora said. Some disappointed voters expressed disbelief at the election outcome.

“This is daylight robbery, but I think the MDC should have realised that, without violence, Zanu-PF would still do something to cheat,” said McDonald Sibanda, a 34-year-old insurance salesman. “I’m disgusted.”

An MDC protest could elicit a fierce response from security forces and pro-Mugabe militias, who were accused of killing 200 MDC supporters after Mugabe lost the first round of the 2008 election.