In press advertisements published in private papers the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) called on its members to "find something better to do" next Saturday, rather than vote in the senate polls.

"The ZCTU would rather have the billions budgeted for senate to be channelled towards the improvement of salaries for teachers, policemen, soldiers and nurses in government hospitals," the labour body said.

The senate is being introduced under constitutional amendments voted in by President Robert Mugabe's party earlier this year.

The amendments also allow the authorities to confiscate passports from opponents and to nationalise all agricultural land.

In a separate statement published in the private press yesterday, the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition (CCZ), an umbrella body for local rights groups, called on political parties and ordinary people to boycott the senate polls.

The coalition called the constitutional amendments a "gross abuse of power" by the ruling party "to guard its political and economic power at the expense of real national development."

The looming election has created a deep rift in the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party.

MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai is campaigning for a poll boycott, while other senior party officials want to participate.

Only 26 MDC candidates, who defied Tsvangirai and registered to contest the election, are to battle it out with Mugabe's Zanu-PF party in Saturday's poll for 50 senate seats.

The ZCTU, a close ally of the MDC, and many civic groups are in favour of Tsvangirai's call for a poll boycott.

Pro-senate opposition officials however say trade union leaders are angling for senior party posts by supporting the boycott call.

- Nampa-Sapa

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