JOHANNESBURG - More Zimbabweans now in South Africa have fled to escape political repression than the economic crisis ravaging their homeland, a survey showed on Tuesday.

The study, conducted in three Johannesburg suburbs, said 58 percent of 4,654 Zimbabweans polled had left home for political reasons, while 51 percent had fled because of economic turmoil, marked by a world record 6,600 percent inflation rate, and chronic shortages of food, fuel, jobs and foreign exchange.

"Summed up under 'political reasons', we included political beatings, persecution, torture, denial of human and property rights," said a statement on the research led by Professor Daniel Makina of the University of South Africa.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has been accused of widespread human rights abuses and mismanagement of the economy, once one of Africa's most promising.

He denies the allegations and accuses Western powers of working with the opposition to oust him in retaliation for his controversial seizures of white-owned farms for landless blacks.

The majority of Zimbabweans who have fled to neighbouring South Africa are in the 21-40 age group. Unemployment in Zimbabwe is about 80 percent, and aid groups have forecast widespread hunger by the end of the year.

An estimated two to three million Zimbabweans have fled to South Africa, the continent's biggest economy, and the exodus has strained other economies in southern Africa too.

Fifty-seven percent of the Zimbabweans polled said they were seeking refugee status in South Africa, where officials have said they regard the Zimbabweans as economic migrants.

Forty-six percent said they wanted to start their own businesses, while 37 percent were seeking work permits.

"Evidently the majority earn below 2000 rand ($285) a month, possibly an indication of exploitation by virtue of having no legal status or purely because of a measure of desperation..." the study said.

"Consequently the majority are in dire need of assistance to secure refugee status, or any other form of residence permit," said the study.