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elections will be required to submit their party lists in advance to allow for the sharing of the seats, according to Electoral Act amendments endorsed by Cabinet on Tuesday. The amendments were made to align the Electoral Act with the new Constitution ahead of the polls expected to be held by July 31.
Justice and Legal Affairs Minister Patrick Chinamasa said without the party lists, the political parties would not be considered for proportional representation system.
“The lists should have six people per province in respect of the women’s quota and six per province for the Senate and 10 per province on the provincial council,” he said. “If they submit the party lists, it means they will participate in the sharing of seats available for allocation.
“After the elections, Zec will, province by province, aggregate the votes cast for candidates of the political parties which are participating in the proportional representation system. They will divide the aggregate figure by six in case of the Senate and women’s quota and by 10 in case of the provincial council members.”
Added Minister Chinamasa: “This will give us what we call the quota which in terms of figures is the value of each seat. Zec will proceed to aggregate the votes cast for candidates of each political party participating in the proportional representation system without regards to whether that candidate won the election or not.
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“The aggregate for each political party will then be divided by the quota to determine how many seats to give to that party.”
Minister Chinamasa said if there was a remainder, it would be dealt with after the initial allocation of seats.
On people living with disabilities, Minister Chinamasa said two representatives would be selected through an electoral college to represent them in the Senate.
Members of the electoral college, Minister Chinamasa said, would be composed of people living with disabilities.
“In the new Constitution, there is a provision that two persons have to be elected to the Senate to represent persons with disabilities,” he said.
“We have agreed to create an electoral college to elect these two, who obviously should be a man and a woman.”
Minister Chinamasa said each form of disability had a national association and each would be required to nominate four delegates to constitute the electoral college.
“We have been advised that there are 16 national associations representing one form of disability or another, for example, we have a national association for the blind or the deaf and dumb,” he said. “These, each of them, have to give us two women and two men to go into the electoral college.
Online Reporter