According to Zimbabwe’s opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), its leader Morgan Tsvangirai won the presidential election with 50.3 percent of the vote. However, the official results have not yet been released.

MDC general secretary Tendai Biti claims that the result shows that there is no need for an election runoff against President Robert Mugabe, as the state newspaper said that a candidate needs 50 percent plus 1 vote to avoid a runoff.

“The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission yesterday released more election results with indications that Zanu-PF and the MDC Tsvangirai faction are headed for a tie in the House of Assembly poll, while the pattern of results in the presidential election shows that none of the candidates will garner more than 50 percent of the vote, forcing a re-run,” the newspaper “The Herald” said, cited by the Associated Press.

Meanwhile, Tsvangirai held a news conference and acted as if he was already been declared president. “For years we have trod a journey of hunger, pain, torture and brutality,” he declared. “Today we face a new challenge of governing and rehabilitating our beloved country, the challenge of giving birth to a new Zimbabwe founded on restoration not retribution, on love not war,” he added. Tsvangirai, 56, also denied his party was negotiating the departure of Mugabe from power.

The European Union claimed it wants Mugabe to step down and the U.S. declared that it believed the opposition had won. “It's clear the people of Zimbabwe have voted for change,” National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

Thokozani Khupe of the opposition MDC is worried, as after three days of waiting there is still no clear sign of who will lead Zimbabwe in the future. “The people of Zimbabwe will not allow Zanu-PF to steal their election anymore,” she said quoted by BBC News.

The 84-year-old President Mugabe ruled uninterrupted since Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980.