Chinhoyi, Zimbabwe/Johannesburg  - Supporters of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe gathered in the farming town of Chinhoyi on Saturday to mark their leader's 85th birthday at a lavish party, as more than half the country's population faces abject poverty.

Mugabe's birthday fell on February 21 but loyalists from his political party Zanu PF postponed the celebrations as they were raising money for the event.

"I think it is going to be a great day for the legend and icon whose birthday we are celebrating today here," said Patrick Zhuwawo, one of the fundraisers and a nephew of Mugabe. "The country might be having problems but we need to have a day to honour the sacrifices the president has made for this country."

Said to have cost at least 250,000 US dollars, the jamboree's menu is reported to include champagne, cognac, lobster, caviar, and duck.

The celebrations come as Zimbabwe has asked other African countries for 2 billion US dollars to begin repairing the health, education, sanitation, water and other systems and to revitalize industry.

A regional summit has been called to decide on the request.

Located about 120 kilometres north-west of the capital Harare, Chinhoyi is also home to government hospital where only a hand-full of nurses attend to patients.

"There are no medicines," said one nurse. "These patients have no option but to come here but there is nothing we can do."

Mugabe is blamed for driving the country into economic meltdown.

A cholera epidemic has claimed close to 4,000 people, and the United Nations says that more than five million people need urgent food aid.

Meanwhile, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) spokesman Nelson Chamisa denied media reports that former opposition leader, now Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, will attend the bash.

"He is not attending the birthday party, I am not sure where the media is getting the information to the contrary," said Chamisa. "Mr Tsvangirai has other commitments as far as I know."

Tsvangirai last year called Mugabe's birthday celebrations "a gathering of the satisfied few."

Western donors have been adopting a wait-and-see approach with regard to the two-week-old unity arrangement, which has been sorely tested by the state's refusal to release over 30 political prisoners, including several MDC members.

On Friday, the state agreed to release most of them - on the condition that they withdraw litigation against their captors for torture they suffered in custody, their lawyer said.

"It is a patently unlawful condition," Beatrice Mtetwa said. "It's the most shocking thing I've heard."

The offer excluded Roy Bennett, Tsvangirai's popular agriculture deputy minister-designate who was arrested on the day the new government was inaugurated and charged with possessing weapons for the purpose of insurgency.

Addressing party faithful at the birthday celebrations, Mugabe said that his government's policy of redistributing land from white farmers would continue, saying there would be "no going back."

"They must vacate those farms. They must vacate those farms I said. They must vacate those farms," a combative Mugabe told the crowd.

What is left of Zimbabwe's beleaguered white farming community is now reeling from a wave of new farm invasions by supporters of Mugabe, which began days before the swearing-in of Morgan Tsvangirai as prime minister on February 11.

More than 150 white farmers are facing often violent, illegal eviction attempts despite the country being in desperate need of crops to feed around 7 million people that are critically short on food. (dpa)