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HARARE - Incumbent Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai formally entered Zimbabwe's presidential election race on Thursday, setting the stage for probably the toughest campaign in two decades.

The filing of their nomination papers for the March 9-10 poll paves the way for Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) to launch its biggest challenge to Mugabe, who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980.

Both men were confident of winning the vote, which will be contested amid the country's biggest political and economic crisis since independence, embodied in the officially backed violent seizures of white-owned farms.

The nominations came shortly after the biggest state-run newspaper applauded the Commonwealth for rejecting a British call to suspend Zimbabwe from the 54-nation group, claiming a diplomatic victory over the former colonial power.

Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa filed election papers on behalf of Mugabe at Harare's High Court and predicted victory for the veteran leader.

"We are confident that our president will win the election," said Chinamasa, flanked by officials from Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party.

Tsvangirai, a former trade union chief, personally handed over his nomination papers to the court. "With a free and fair election the MDC will win the election," he said.

Attacks on the independence of the judiciary and the media, combined with sweeping new legislation giving the security forces broad powers to deal with government opponents, have led many to question whether the election can be fair.

Commonwealth foreign ministers rejected British-led calls on Wednesday for Zimbabwe's suspension from the organisation because of attacks on the opposition and the media.

But the group pressed instead for the immediate deployment of election observers for the poll.

"Zimbabwe pulled yet another diplomatic coup on the 'mighty British Empire' when their proposal to suspend Zimbabwe from an organisation led by their Queen was thrown out of the window," the official Herald newspaper said in an editorial.

A Commonwealth statement called for "an immediate end to violence and intimidation and that the police and army refrain from party political statements and activities".

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw had sought Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth's main decision-making bodies and a recommendation from the ministers for its complete suspension at a March 2-5 Commonwealth summit in Australia.

Chinamasa blamed the MDC and the media for fanning violence and said ZANU-PF had nothing to gain from such attacks.

"We are the victims of a press campaign led by the MDC. They provoke violence and run to the press to blame it on our party. We have nothing to gain from violence," he said.

EU foreign ministers agreed on Monday to impose a travel ban on the top 20 individuals in Mugabe's inner circle and their families and to freeze their foreign assets if Zimbabwe prevented the deployment of EU election observers. Nampa-Reuters

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