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President Mugabe has said the by-elections should be held concurrently with harmonised polls in order to reduce the burden on the fiscus.
“The Electoral Act further mandates ZEC to approve and authorise organisations and individuals who may apply to conduct voter education and to approve the voter education materials and programmes,” read the statement.
“ZEC is therefore requesting civic society organisations interested in conducting voter education to submit details to ZEC headquarters by October 9 2012.”
ZEC’s invitation was made in terms of the recently promulgated Electoral Act.
ZEC said those interested were required to have a certificate of registration, comprehensive organisation profile including board members and general membership, telephone numbers, constitution, mandate, among other details.
The electoral body said successful organisations would be contacted from 12 October 2012.
The need to vet organisations that conduct voter education came in the wake of some groups that had been campaigning for some political parties under the guise of voter education.
The Electoral Act gives ZEC power to vet organisations and assess their material before it is disseminated to the public.
ZEC acting chairperson Mrs Joyce Kazembe said on Tuesday that some bodies that wanted to work with ZEC would undergo training.
She was addressing journalists on the electoral body’s lined-up activities ahead of the March polls.
Mrs Kazembe said ZEC had conducted voter education at different places.
“Voter education has always been part of the electoral process and it is ongoing. As in the past, the commission has conducted voter education at exhibitions such as the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair and at provincial agricultural shows,” she said.
Mrs Kazembe said ZEC has of late been distributing material for voter education.
“Currently all the commission’s 10 provincial electoral offices have received the voter education materials as of Friday, 14 September 2012. They are currently distributing these to the district electoral offices,” she said.
The commission, she said, had since October 2011, held a number of stakeholder consultative workshops aimed at consulting and educating the public about its activities.
“Funds permitting, more voter education materials will be produced and information will be disseminated throughout the country on a continuous basis using drama, electronic media, talk shows, door-to-door voter education, press conferences, among other dissemination methods,” she said.
Bongani Ndlovu
Online Reporter