Johannesburg  - Tens of thousands of farmworkers have been chased off the land in Zimbabwe in a month-long campaign of violence by supporters of President Robert Mugabe designed to cleanse rural areas of opposition supporters, a farmworkers union said Thursday.

"The situation of farmworkers is really pathetic," Gertrude Hambira, general secretary of the General Agriculture and Plantation Workers' Union of Zimbabwe (GAPWUZ), told a press conference in Johannesburg.

Of the 40,000 farmworkers displaced in attacks on farms by youth militia close to Mugabe's Zanu-PF party since March 29 elections, many have fled to urban areas in search of safety but some 400 are living in the bush with their families, she said.

Because Zimbabweans are obliged to vote in their ward, those who had left their areas will probably not be able to vote in a mooted runoff presidential election between Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, GAPWUZ and the Justice for Agriculture (JAG) Zimbabwe lobby group pointed out.

A runoff has emerged as likely after both men failed to win an outright majority in the elections.

Since the polls, in scenes reminiscent of the 2000 wave of farm invasions that kickstarted Zimbabwe's controversial land reform programme, youth militia have fanned out across the country chasing white farmers and black farmworkers off the land.

Forty-three white farmers have been permanently evicted from their land, said John Worsley-Worswick, the chief executive office of JAG, which represents displaced farmers.

The government has presented the onslaught as an attempt to keep land in the hands of black Zimbabweans. The MDC and rights groups have accused Zanu-PF of punishing people suspected of voting for Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).

In the past rural dwellers mostly voted for Mugabe and his party but many swung towards the MDC this time.

The MDC beat Zanu-PF in parliamentary elections and Tsvangirai also took more votes than Mugabe in the presidential vote, with 47.9 per cent to Mugabe's 43.2 per cent.

Some of the farmworkers have been forced to undergo brutal voter "re-education" rituals, in which they have been beaten and sometimes tortured, JAG and GAPWUZ said. The militia sometimes wore army uniforms, but most were not soldiers, they said.

Workers who sought medical attention in towns were often turned back by the militia at roadblocks, they added.

Since 2000, only 2 per cent of the around 350,000 black farmworkers displaced by land reform have been given land, Worsley-Worswick said.

Those who had gone to work for the new farmers - mostly ruling party members or cronies, including 18 High Court judges - have been trying for months to improve their wages.

The farmers are offering the workers 30 million Zimbabwe dollars a month, worth only around 60 US cents.

"All this goes to show that this was not about land reform at all. It was about a political programme," said Worsley-Worswick.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission has yet to announce a date for the second round but has hinted it could be anytime within the next 12 months.

On Wednesday southern African and African election observers said the violence in Zimbabwe, which the MDC says has claimed 25 of its members, meant a runoff election was unadvisable for the time being. (dpa)