HARARE: Zimbabwe’s opposition faced a midnight deadline on Friday to mount a court challenge to the results of presidential elections marked by allegations of fraud and followed by a government crackdown, reports AFP.

The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) alleges that President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s slender victory in Zimbabwe’s first post-Mugabe election was rigged.

Mnangagwa, who is seeking to reverse Zimbabwe’s economic isolation and attract desperately needed foreign investment, had vowed the elections would turn a page on Robert Mugabe’s repressive 37-year rule.

International monitors largely praised the conduct of the election itself, although EU observers said that Mnangagwa, a former Mugabe ally, benefitted from an “un-level playing field” and some voter intimidation.

Mnangagwa of the ruling ZANU-PF party won the presidential race with 50.8 percent of the vote—just enough to avoid a run-off against the MDC’s Nelson Chamisa, who scored 44.3 percent.