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THE political parties’ leaders that have been criss-crossing the length and breadth of this country in their bid to drum up support ahead of the harmonised elections tomorrow, wound up most of their meetings at the weekend. Zanu-PF had its last star rally addressed by President Mugabe on Sunday at the National Sports Stadium in Harare. The MDC-T’s last rally was in Harare yesterday. The parties could be holding mop up meetings today in different parts of the country in a last minute attempt to woo voters. The campaigning, it has to be admitted, has been peaceful throughout with main political parties Zanu-PF and MDC-T and MDC conducting peaceful road shows in different parts of the country.
The leaders of political parties have been able to restrain their supporters from engaging in violence hence the prevailing peaceful environment that the country is enjoying ahead of the elections. The elections have generated a lot of interest globally and a number of observers drawn from the African Union, Southern African Development Community and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa are already in the country to observe the elections. Some of these observers have been in the country since last month and have been attending some of the campaign meetings.
A lot of ground has been covered and what is left is for the voters to cast their votes tomorrow. The environment, as already alluded to, has been peaceful throughout though there have been disturbing reports of road traffic accidents that have claimed lives of people going to political rallies and returning. It is a fact that during the campaign period, there is a lot of excitement and this is largely to blame for the many accidents witnessed so far.
We want to once again appeal to Zimbabweans to avoid unnecessary loss of lives through these accidents. It does not do us good as a nation to avoid loss of lives through politically-motivated violence, only to lose lives through accidents. Drivers ferrying people to the mop up meetings to be held today should therefore exercise extreme caution to avoid accidents. The last hurdle is usually the toughest so it is important that those that have worked so hard to ensure the success of this plebiscite do not fail at the last hurdle.
Leaders of political parties should ensure that as their supporters wind up campaign meetings, they do not soil what has been endorsed by many independent observers as violent-free campaign period. The political parties, as already stated, are winding up campaigns today and now it is the responsibility of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to do the actual conduct of elections.
We have no reasons to doubt that everything is now in place for the people to cast the vote. Zec has been briefing the nation at every stage of elections preparations through its regular press briefings, some of which were attended by elections observers. We have said it before that those who have marketed their programmes and policies well to the electorate will be rewarded tomorrow. The participating parties need not panic or cause unnecessary alarm and despondency.
The nation should have been taken aback by the reckless and unwarranted utterances by MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai that he will announce the results of the elections and declare himself the winner. Mr Tsvangirai told his party supporters in Domboshava last Friday that he will collate results posted outside polling stations and announce them. In terms of the Electoral Act, only Zec has the mandate to announce elections results. What really is the rush Mr Tsvangirai given the fact that Zec is supposed to announce the results within five days according to our constitution?
What is clear is that Mr Tsvangirai is panicking and is therefore looking for an excuse to discredit the outcome of the elections. The President, Cde Mugabe, has made it very clear that whoever breaks the law will be arrested and Mr Tsvangirai risks being arrested if he goes ahead with his ill-advised move to take over Zec’s responsibility to announce the elections results.
Online Reporter