Five years ago the opposition party in Zimbabwe, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), came very close to winning the general election, despite ballot-rigging on a grand scale and vicious intimidation by government-backed militia.
As the country's hungry and weary voters return to the polling stations on Thursday, Robert Mugabe's ruling party will be determined to ensure another electoral victory, whatever it takes.
This time, however, it will not be so straightforward for Mugabe. True, the opposition will not be given a fair chance. The government controls all broadcast media and critical print journalism is not allowed. Last month the MDC's elections director was arrested for organising an "illegal gathering" - he had called the party's election candidates to a meeting. Almost all the MDC's members of parliament have been arrested or beaten up, many of them by the Chipangano gang, Mugabe's militia.
Rather, it is within the ranks of Mugabe's own party, Zanu-PF, that trouble lurks for the president. Having just celebrated his 81st birthday, the thoughts of his party are taken up with the succession. The so-called "Young Turks" wanted Emmerson Mnangagwa, the speaker of parliament, nominated as heir apparent. Mugabe was having none of it. He instead appointed an old ally, Joyce Mujuru, and expelled the leading dissidents. She, like Mugabe, comes from the Zezeru wing of the dominant Shona people, leaving the two other biggest Shona groups out in the cold. Mugabe is narrowing his support base and some of the dissidents, notably Jonathan Moyo, the former information minister, are standing for election.
Despite the disunity in Zanu-PF, the party is almost certain to secure a two-thirds majority. Mugabe promised other southern African leaders last year that these elections would be fair so there will be less intimidation in public but just as much reliance on the administration of polling, vote-counting and the 500,000 dead people or fake names that remain on the voters' roll.
The outlook for Zimbabwe's people is grim. Less than half the land grabbed from white farmers is being cultivated. Supplies of maizemeal, the staple diet, have run out. One half of the population survives on food aid. Meanwhile, Mugabe concerns himself with the succession. And he is blessed with his neighbours. Tanzania's president, Benjamin Mkapa, denies that the country is ill-governed and blames its problems on the MDC. South Africa's Thabo Mbeki insists that Zimbabwe's problem is conflict between its blacks and whites. With neighbours like that, the pressure on Mugabe to put the interests of his people first is almost non-existent.