ZEC fail to produce verified voters' roll but vows election will proceed regardless - but cannot be free regardless too N Garikai

When both President Mnangagwa and ZEC chairperson, Priscilla Chigumba took office; following last November’s military coup that forced Robert Mugabe and Rita Makarau, respectively, to vacate their offices; the two promised to hold free, fair and credible elections. Now it is clear they are failing to honour their promise.

Even at the time the two took their oath of office, it was already clear ZEC would never register all the 7 million targeted voters because there was no time. The BVR exercise should have started in January 2015, at the very latest, only started in September 2017. ZEC has reportedly registered 5.5 million voters and so 1.5 million voters have already been denied the vote for no fault of their own.

It is inconceivable that President Mnangagwa was not aware of the very late start of the BVR and what the consequences would be, after all he was the Minister of Justice unto the October reshuffle and ZEC fall under his remit until then. As an aspiring ZEC Chairperson Justice Chigumba must have known about the very late start of the voter registration exercise and about the host of other ZEC problems certain to stop the commission delivering the free and fair elections as promised.

The very late start of the voter registration affected everything downstream, there was no way ZEC was ever going to produce a verified voters’ roll in time, many people had predicted. This too has now come to pass and Justice Chigumba has the cheek to suggest we, the people of Zimbabwe, will have no choice but to take this one too on the chin.

"Whether the candidates scrutinise the voters' roll, whether they see any anomalies in it, whatever the anomalies are, whatever legal recourse they have will not stop an election. I want that to be very clear, nothing stops the election," she said.

"Let me put the law into perspective, first thing to take note is once the President has proclaimed the election date, there is nothing short of an earthquake that can stop the election."

With all due respect, madam Justice, President Mnangagwa should surely have consulted and got confirmation from ZEC that the verified voters’ roll was ready before he proclaimed the election date. Having a verified voters’ roll is such a key requirement for free, fair and credible elections it is therefore nonsensical that ZEC should even be arguing the elections should go ahead with it.

In 2013, nearly one million voters were denied the vote, an unacceptably large number given only 4 million voted and Mugabe’s winning margin was just over one million; because their data were not in the constituency voters’ roll they expected it to be. This would have been spotted and corrected if the ZEC had produced a verified voters’ roll as demanded by law. ZEC is making the same mistake again this year and so, many, many more voters will also be denied the vote again, worse this year since voting has been narrowed even more to voting by polling station only.

There are also a thousand and one other ways beside using the dodgy voters' roll for Zanu PF is rigging these elections. There is no free public media, Zanu PF is robbing the nation blind to bankroll its vote rigging and vote buying schemes, etc.

President Mnangagwa has had many golden opportunities to implement the democratic reforms everyone agreed at the onset of the 2008 GNU were necessary for free and fair elections. He has stubbornly refused to implement even one reform. It is the regime’s fault that voter registration was started very late leaving ZEC no time to produce a verified voters’ roll. It is totally nonsensical that the nation should bullied and bamboozled into another flawed election and accept the outcome as a matter of course.  

These elections are not free, fair and credible and all men and women of good judgement must declare the flawed and illegal elections null and void.

If President Mnangagwa and Justice Chigumba cannot deliver on their promise to hold free, fair and credible elections then the nation has every right to demand that the regime stands aside to allow the appointment of an interim administration who will implement the pre-requisite democratic reforms and hold free and fair elections.

“Nothing short of an earthquake that can stop the election!” No Justice Chigumba, there is no need to stop the election; go ahead. What we are demanding is for the elections must be declared null and void because they have failed to meet even the bear minimum standards for free, fair and credible elections!