admin
registration and to address challenges experienced during the voter registration exercise held last month, chairperson Justice Rita Makarau said yesterday.
ZEC, she said, was ready for elections to be held not later than July 31 this year.
Addressing journalists in Harare, Justice Makarau said the new Constitution assented to by President Mugabe on May 22 mandates the Registrar General of Voters, under the supervision of ZEC, to conduct special and intensive voter registration and voters rol inspection for at least 30 days after its publication.
Justice Makarau said the commission had drawn some lessons from the challenges experienced during last month’s voter registration and had put in place measures to address the challenges.
The challenges included inadequate funding, lack of publicity around the exercise, difficulties in using a sworn statement or affidavit in proving residence for urban voters, lack of clarity on change of status for some citizens born to foreign parents, and inadequate timeframes and facilities for citizens wishing to register as voters.
“We have now received the sum of US$20 million for the exercise. We hope, starting with you, and this meeting today, to be able to inform the public of the exercise and other details relating to where registration centres will be located for each ward,” she told the journalists, who included editors from the public and private media.
Read More . . .
“As the body responsible for voter education, we have deployed two voter educators to each ward with effect from tomorrow (today) in some instances.
“These will be in the field to educate and assist all persons wishing to access the registration centres.”
She said the issue of affidavits being used to prove residence had been addressed and that measures had been put in place to ensure that officers from the Registrar General’s Office and ZEC were appointed as commissioners of oaths so that they could commission affidavits at the various registration centres.
Voter educators had been adequately trained on explaining the different categories of persons who qualified to register as citizens.
Justice Makarau said ZEC was concerned with the state of the voters roll and called on registered voters to inspect the roll during the 30-day registration period and bring to the attention of ZEC any anomalies that they may pick up.
She said it was only through the inspection of the voters roll that anomalies on it could be addressed.
“The commission is concerned that the voters roll may not be in the shape that it ought to be before the harmonised elections. In particular, the commission is concerned that people who lawfully registered as voters in a particular ward may have found their names removed from the roll of that ward without their knowledge,” she said.
“We are unable to tell you the magnitude of the problem. No one has come to us with a specific issue. Come and point it to us where you say it is in bad shape. There is a tendency to generalise.
We are giving everybody the golden opportunity to tell us now. We now want to be specific and want to give people their right to vote. Give us the evidence and we will clean it for you,” Justice Makarau said.
She said ZEC had to date not received any official specific complaints from anyone about voters roll.
The commission would be meeting political parties, civic and faith-based organisation this week to get their concerns on the state of the voters roll.
Justice Makarau outlined the legal process leading to the holding of harmonised elections.
She said the electoral period is triggered by proclamation of the election date by President Mugabe.
In the proclamation, the Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces specifies the nomination court dates, postal votes dates, and actual polling dates.
The period between proclamation and nomination is between 14-21 days.
A minimum 30-day period is required between nomination and polling day although it can be extended to 41 days, she said.
Online Reporter