IT is easy to engage in hyperbole in a frank discussion of the parliamentary elections tomorrow. For instance, the walk into the polling booth could be compared with the head-bowed, heart-thumping journey into the Confessional box. Most Catholics, never mind how old, are invariably seized by a heart-stopping anticipation of release or apocalypse as they go to confront their Confessor.

Mostly, it's a leap of faith, as heavy with symbolism as the voter's decision to vote for one rather than the other party courting their vote. Faith is the thing. Those who replace faith with fear may be the traitors, not only to their Conscience and their children, but also to themselves and to the country.

What is faith? Be philosophical, if need be. Faith is reliance or trust in something - the existence of a Supreme Being, or belief in the ability of a party to deliver on its promises. It can be reliance even on a soccer team, having the faith that your team will win the championship cup.

If you were asked: How can you have such faith, not being a clairvoyant or a soothsayer? How do you reply? "I just know it" may be woefully inadequate, if you are talking about faith in God. Not having seen Him or not having actually heard Him speak, how else do you explain your faith?

All this may sound a bit "if-ish", but democracy itself can be placed in that category. The leader of a former Soviet republic, claiming to be its democratically-elected leader, recently fled the country after a majority of his people thought he was ripping them off, politically and otherwise. They installed another leader and are unlikely to look back. The chances of the political fugitive returning to power are zilch.

Georgia's Edward Shevardnadze suffered the same fate. At the time of his ouster, The Herald newspaper in Harare would not give its readers the chapter and verse of his political demise. The cynical view was the editor was told that it might plant subversive ideas into the minds of certain people, people itching to find a way of getting rid of Zanu PF and President Robert Mugabe.

At the time, Jonathan Moyo was in charge of Mugabe's information and propaganda. Today, Moyo is still around, being interviewed by the same journalists he once called "terrorists". His predicament has provoked smirks, chortles, chuckles and guffaws from the same journalists.

Tomorrow could result in a regime change at the ballot box. If the MDC did win a thumping majority of the 120 seats up for grabs, there would have to be a change, if not of government, then certainly of Parliament.

Mugabe would not stand for it. In fact, you have to feel sorry for the man. At no time, since he took over the leadership of Zanu PF in 1975, has he ever felt so challenged. Like the 2000 constitutional referendum and every election since 1980, the contest has always been about Mugabe, not necessarily Zanu PF.

Few leaders have imposed their personality on the leadership of a country as insidiously as Mugabe has done on Zimbabwe. Even his party, Zanu PF, would be nothing without him. What he has managed to instill into the minds of the people is the fear that even the country itself would be lost without him.

Which is why he has managed to personalise this election - it's Mugabe versus Tony Blair. Voters endorsing the Zanu PF candidates will be voting for Mugabe, not their candidate.

Unemployment is about 70 percent, inflation still the highest in the Southern Africa Development Community (Sadc) and Z$15 000 are now worth US$l on the parallel market. The health delivery system has virtually collapsed and the educational facilities are in tatters. There is precious little foreign direct investment in the country and there are four million Zimbabweans living outside their country as economic refugees.

All this, as far as Mugabe is concerned, should not bother the voters. The issue of all issues, for Mugabe and for Zanu PF, is Tony Blair. Jobless, hungry and probably shelterless voters are expected to limp into the voting booth to vote against Tony Blair, in the hope that this act alone will give them jobs, food and shelter.

Unless Mugabe and Zanu PF have prepared the most elaborate rigging machinery to win this election, their platform should drive most voters to vote against them. But Zanu PF has rigged elections before and could do so again tomorrow. Anybody believing that this party has suddenly been hit by the righteous bug is day-dreaming. Only if the unexpected happens could Zanu PF lose the way it ought to lose an election with its poor record.

At one time, during the campaign, some people thought Mugabe had seen the light. The MDC was being allowed to campaign more freely than ever before. It was being given a lot more time on radio and television. Morgan Tsvangirai was on TV more frequently than during his treason trial. His rallies were given footage that almost equaled Mugabe's.

There was speculation that Mugabe had decided he would leave the political scene with his record as the great liberator unsullied by an election in which his party won by treachery. The man is serving his last term and will soon pass into history.

He will always be remembered as the man who launched the Gukurahundi war against ex-Zipra guerillas, in which 20 000 died, among them innocent women and children. He will also be remembered as the man who launched the so-called Third Chimurenga in which white farmers and their black workers were killed in 2000.

But apparently he may not have wanted to be remembered, on top of all that, as the man who destroyed his country, economically, because he harboured a personal vendetta against Tony Blair. Or perhaps he genuinely wants the international community to re-engage him politically and economically. So, he allows the opposition to do as any opposition would do in a truly democratic country.

Still, for many students of Mugabeism, the expectation of a truly free and fair election is something of a mirage. People, in general, have lost faith in Mugabe and would not vote for him if all things were equal.

For instance, there is a bizarre story about the computers the president has been donating to many rural schools. The story is told of the computers being the same at every school. None of them are being left at the schools, but are being ferried to the next one, to be presented as another batch - so the rumour goes. This could be a falsehood concocted by his enemies, but it illustrates, more than any other public relations gaffe his spin doctors have committed, the people's loss of faith in Mugabe. That could be his final undoing tomorrow.