May 2 (Bloomberg) -- Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai will boycott a second-round presidential election, his party said, after the Electoral Commission ruled he lacked the majority needed to defeat incumbent Robert Mugabe.

The decision to hold a runoff, rather than declare Tsvangirai the winner of the March 29 vote, is ``theft,'' Tendai Biti, secretary general of the Movement for Democratic Change, told reporters at a news conference in Johannesburg, in neighboring South Africa.

``The delay was intended for one thing and one thing only, to massage'' the result, Biti said. ``The announcement today was theft, grand theft.''

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission said Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, took 47.9 percent of the vote in the presidential balloting, compared with Mugabe's 43.2 percent. The MDC maintains Tsvangirai had 50.3 percent of the ballots, giving him an outright majority that means no runoff is required.

The rest of the vote went to two other candidates, Simba Makoni and Langton Towungana.

Mugabe is ready to compete in a runoff, Emmerson Mnangagwa, his election agent and a cabinet minister, said in an interview from Harare, Zimbabwe's capital.

``He accepts the results as announced by the ZEC and is offering himself for re-election,'' Mnangagwa said.

Adding the Votes

The MDC tallied votes posted outside individual polling stations. Electoral Commission figures show that Tsvangirai was deprived of about 50,000 votes and Mugabe was given more than 37,000 votes that he shouldn't have had, Biti said.

The opposition proposes forming a government of ``national healing,'' and calls for a summit on the Zimbabwe crisis by the 14-member Southern African Development Community, Biti said. The MDC disputes the legal need for a runoff and says the current economic situation and violence in the country make a runoff impossible.

``There cannot be a runoff in Zimbabwe for the simple reason that the country is burning,'' Biti said.

At least 20 people have died and thousands have been made homeless after attacks by Mugabe's ``Green Bombers'' youth militia, war veterans and troops loyal to Zanu-PF, the opposition said.

MDC officials and international human rights groups have accused Mugabe supporters of mounting a ``campaign of violence'' to intimidate the opposition into supporting the president in a runoff.

Mugabe Loses Assembly

Mugabe, 84, who has been in power for 28 years since the country won its independence form the U.K., saw his Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front party lose its majority for the first time in the concurrent elections for the National Assembly.

Zanu-PF intends to challenge in court the results in 52 of the 110 Assembly races the MDC won, Mnangagwa said.

While the MDC won't accept Mugabe taking any further part in government, the party will assure his safety from human rights charges and asset seizures, Biti said. The MDC's executive committee will meet over the next two days and Tsvangirai, 56, will make an announcement about the course the party will now follow, probably on May 4, he said.

Britain's Foreign Office said the release of results five weeks after the presidential poll ``lacked credibility.''

U.K. Decries Violence

``President Mugabe's campaign of violence and intimidation coupled with the arrest of 99 electoral commission officials in the last month show exactly how Zanu-PF will approach any second round,'' a Foreign Office spokeswoman said in an e-mailed statement today. ``Without an immediate end to violence and the introduction of a wider range of international monitors and in much greater numbers than were present for the first, no second round could be free and fair.''

The U.S. State Department yesterday said Zimbabwe won't be able to hold a fair runoff election for president because the opposition is being targeted.

``It would almost be impossible to hold one, given the current campaign of state-orchestrated violence and intimidation against the political opposition,'' Tom Casey, State Department deputy spokesman, said in Washington. Mugabe should ``call off his dogs and cease his security services' and his supporters' attacks.''

To contact the reporter on this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.net; Brian Latham via the Johannesburg bureau at asguazzin@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: May 2, 2008 14:27 EDT