JOHANNESBURG, March 31 (Reuters) - Bloggers mixed wild rumours with gallows humour on Monday as Zimbabweans waited on tenterhooks for the result of the most crucial election since independence.
The opposition MDC and ruling ZANU-PF were running neck-and-neck in first parliamentary results issued by the electoral commission, 36 hours after polls closed.
Many bloggers shared opposition suspicions that the delay meant President Robert Mugabe was trying to rig the result to extend his 28 years in power.
"Across the country Zimbabweans agree that the MDC has trounced ZANU-PF but they don't believe (correctly) that this automatically translates into Mr Mugabe handing over the keys to State House, and his black Mercedes," wrote a blogger called Bev Clark on http://kubatanablogs.net/kubatana/ -- an online community of Zimbabwean activists.
Even in cyberspace the tension of waiting for the results began to tell.
"It's late and if I watch (MDC secretary general) Tendai Biti making the same comments on the same report they have been running since this morning I am going to do grievous bodily harm to the next person who walks through the door," one blogger wrote on thisiszimbabwe http://www.sokwanele.com/thisiszimbabwe/ Writing on Sunday, poet Samm Farai Monro, better known as Comrade Fatso, told on his blog http://comradefatso.vox.com/ of wild rumours flying around the capital Harare.