The video of a lady counting envelopes containing
postal ballots at Rose Camp Police Station in Bulawayo has ignited a social
media storm fuelled by denial, contradictions and counter accusations by both
ZEC and the Police when asked to explain what was going on. The incident may
not be the smoking gun proving these elections are being rigged but it is the
tell-tale no smoke without a fire!
What is clear is that there are some people in
the Police, Army, etc. who are entitled to postal vote. If one was to put aside
the confusing statements from ZEC suggesting the commission is still printing
ballot paper (postal ballots can be send out ballot papers), is still sorting
out who is entitled to a postal vote, etc. The video suggests postal ballots
had indeed been send out and were now being collected or be it in the most
chaotic and disorderly fashion one can imagine!
One assumes that the Police Officers who were entitled to the postal votes had been instructed to return their completed ballots to the Police Station for safe keeping and secure onward transmission to ZEC. What the video showed is the slice in this secure onward transmission, the handover of the collected postal ballots from the Police to ZEC officials.
One expected the Police and ZEC officials to carefully examine each envelop to separate the valid from those that will be considered invalid because the envelop was not sealed or for whatever reason. The process should be methodical, thorough, orderly and dignified process. What people saw in the video was the exact opposite.
One has to ask how secure were the ballot up to this point? There was an unusually high number of opened envelopes (as many as 40%, I would say), the instruction clearly stated that the envelop must be sealed. No effort made to ascertain whether this was the voter failing to follow instruction or someone else who had custard of the envelops opening the envelops to check how certain individuals had voted.
One assumes that the Police Officers who were entitled to the postal votes had been instructed to return their completed ballots to the Police Station for safe keeping and secure onward transmission to ZEC. What the video showed is the slice in this secure onward transmission, the handover of the collected postal ballots from the Police to ZEC officials.
One expected the Police and ZEC officials to carefully examine each envelop to separate the valid from those that will be considered invalid because the envelop was not sealed or for whatever reason. The process should be methodical, thorough, orderly and dignified process. What people saw in the video was the exact opposite.
One has to ask how secure were the ballot up to this point? There was an unusually high number of opened envelopes (as many as 40%, I would say), the instruction clearly stated that the envelop must be sealed. No effort made to ascertain whether this was the voter failing to follow instruction or someone else who had custard of the envelops opening the envelops to check how certain individuals had voted.
Zanu PF officials and thugs alike have always
boasted of having ways of knowing how individuals have voted. In Zimbabwe your
vote is NOT your secret! Is this incident just another case of the regime
spying on its citizens!
If the ZEC officials were truly diligent and independent
and their commitment to holding free, fair and credible elections was beyond
questioning then they should have ordered a thorough investigation into this Rose
Camp Police Station incident. The number of postal votes from Bulawayo and the
nation at large may be small, 5% at most; it is the blatant vote rigging that
is important. If this could happen here what is there stopping it happening and
many other settings?
The nation would want to know if the open
envelops were tampered with? Could it be that the sealed envelopes too had been
opened and then carefully resealed? Finding out whom those in the open and
sealed envelopes had voted for would help point to who could be behind this.
If the ballot papers are not secure how can the
vote be secure?
SADC leaders realised that the 2008 to 2013 GNU had failed to implement even one democratic reform, they wanted the elections postponed and told both Zanu PF and MDC leaders of that. “If you go into next month’s elections, you will lose!” they warned Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends. “The elections are done!”
SADC leaders realised that the 2008 to 2013 GNU had failed to implement even one democratic reform, they wanted the elections postponed and told both Zanu PF and MDC leaders of that. “If you go into next month’s elections, you will lose!” they warned Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends. “The elections are done!”
Sadly, MDC leaders did not listen and the participated
in the flawed and illegal elections which Zanu PF went on to blatantly rig. The
rest is history.
If anyone thought MDC leaders had learned the lesson
not to participate in any more elections until the reforms designed to stop
Zanu PF blatantly rigging the vote were implemented, it is the individual who
has learned the lesson – MDC leaders are so corrupt and incompetent they are
beyond the pale. There is no excuse why MDC has dragged the nation into these
elections knowing fully well that with no reforms Zanu PF will once again
blatantly rig these elections.
Every day and at every turn we have uncovers one
serious shortcoming after another in the conduct of these elections. ZEC has
failed to register 1.5 million voters or 23% of its targeted 7 million, failed
to produce a clean and verified voters’ roll at least one month before nomination
day, etc. because the voter registration exercise was started very late. There
is no free public media; etc.; etc. and now this Rose Camp Police Station
incident is showing the ballots are not secure.
Zimbabwe will not be facing this electoral mess if MDC leaders had not sold-out during the GNU and implemented the reforms. They are compounding the mess, by repeatedly refusing to listen to SADC leaders to postpone the elections until the reforms are in place.
Zimbabwe will not be facing this electoral mess if MDC leaders had not sold-out during the GNU and implemented the reforms. They are compounding the mess, by repeatedly refusing to listen to SADC leaders to postpone the elections until the reforms are in place.
He (Mnangagwa) also accused G-40 elements- Saviour Kasukuwere, Grace Mugabe, Patrick Zhuwawo, and Ignatius Chombo of capturing executive powers.
ReplyDeleteThis is just a case of the kettle calling the pot black; because, as we know G40 members are accusing Mnangagwa and his Lacoste faction of exactly the same. Given that Mnangagwa and company stage a military coup and did not follow the constitutional route of vote of no confidence, impeachment, etc. there is no doubt who has a legal leg to stand on!
These elections are a lot more than the nation electing a new government but will be an unofficial referendum of what the nation thinks of last November's coup. President Mnangagwa and his junta are painfully aware of this much more so given the increasing influence of Mugabe and his NPF over Chamisa. A Chamisa victory will embolden Mugabe and the demands for those behind the November coup will only get louder!
"We are not worried about their demonstrations. Let them demonstrate because even if they protest in numbers that does not mean they will win the elections.
ReplyDeleteLet us wait for election day and we will prove to the whole world that Zanu PF stands for the will of the people," Mnangagwa said.
Yes, Mr President, we know just how you intent to "prove to the whole world that Zanu PF stands for the will of the people" - by rigging the elections just as you have always done! You promised to hold free, fair and credible elections but has since stubbornly refused to implement even one meaningful reform to make that possible.
These elections should have never ever taken place with no reforms in place. The nation must demand these elections to be declared null and void or we will never ever get out of this economic and political mess Zanu PF landed us in!
@ David
ReplyDelete"Now the whole world knows that Zimbabwe's 2018 Elections are not going to be Credible," you said. And you are right.
What the whole world has failed to understand is why the MDC is determined to continue participating in these elections everyone including the MDC leaders themselves are admitting are being rigged. The whole world knows that MDC leaders are contesting these elections for the sake of winning the few gravy train seats Zanu PF is dangling as bait.
Yes, the world has lost confidence in Zanu PF for its contempt for destroying Zimbabwe's once thriving economy and causing the tragic human suffering and deaths. The world also condemn MDC leaders' greed for the betrayal of the nation. MDC leaders have made it easy for Zanu PF to continue to ride roughshod over the people's hopes and dreams by running with the hare and hunting with the hounds!
During the 2008 elections Zanu PF showed in the nation that it has the power to overwrite whatever democratic decision the voters made. Zanu Pf showed that it had the veto and what good is a vote when someone has the veto. The only way Zanu PF can have its veto taken away is by implementing the democratic reforms ending its carte blanche power.
ReplyDeleteMDC leader had the golden opportunity to implement the reforms during the GNU. SADC leaders were right to advise that elections should be postponed until the reforms are in place. It is mid-summer madness to keep holding the elections knowing fully well Zanu PF will rig the vote and wield its veto.
The only logical thing to do now is to have these flawed elections declared null and void and put an end to this madness!
@ Orga
ReplyDeleteThis is the most important issue of our generation and the consequences of messing up - of having yet another rigged elections - is the national economy sinking even deeper into the abyss, the continued suffering of our people 3/4 of whom already live on less that US$1.00 a day and hundreds of thousands are year are dying unnecessarily, etc. and all you can think about is a correcting a gramma mistake. What a mindless moron!
In short the entire practice of forcing police officers and soldiers to vote collectively in, at best, the presence of their commanding officers, and at worst openly in front of their commanding officers, is a shocking breach of sections 74 and 75 of the Electoral Act and sections 155 and 156 of the Constitution.
ReplyDeleteOnce again ZEC has breached the law. That some of its Commissioners such as Moyo Qhubani should still be defending these illegalities is profoundly unprofessional.
Mr Coltart, we have already established that ZEC, as it is presently constituted, will never ever deliver a free, fair and credible elections hence the need for it to be reformed. You have said so yourself in your recent book.
"The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn't now do the obvious - withdraw from the (2013) elections," you wrote.
"The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility."
We all know these elections should not be taking place, not without implementing the reforms first. The only relevant question is how long are you and your MDC friends going to continue dragging this nation into utterly pointless elections to gratify your greed? Stop pontificating and just answer the question!
@ Mike Tawanda
ReplyDelete"As ED has been saying now since he came into office: There is no more Mr. Nice Guy. No tolerance for corruption must be a way of life, not a mere slogan. Rumours have been circulating for a while that the president was becoming frustrated with the lack of movement from the Prosecutor General's office. ED is no fool. He has been around the block. He knows when there is funny business, and while his amnesty brought in an incredible 850 million US dollars of stolen moneys, he has wanted to catch some big fish. Yet there was foot dragging, too much of it. And it is time for a change," you said.
You are right about ED having "been around the block!" When it comes to corruption he has certainly been around the block countless times. He and a few other Zimbabweans were named in the UN report documenting the wholesale looting and plunder by foreigners in the DRC. He has claimed his lion's share of the looting and plunder in Zimbabwe, but the full details are yet to be properly documented.
ED is one of the richest individuals in Zimbabwe and has made his fortune at the time when the country's economy suffered its worst economic meltdown. It is either he is an entrepreneur with a real nose for business or he is exceptional corrupt.
If ED was serious about "wanting to catch some big fish" then he does not need to cast his net any further that his own junta cabinet including himself. Of course, he is not serious about ending corruption because a cobra will never bite one of its own for the simple reason that, before its victim dies, its last act would be to bite back!
The firing of PG Goba is an election gimmick to fool the naïve and gullible into believe it was Goba's fault that no big fish had been landed in the last eight months of Mnangagwa's rule! Zimbabweans must not allow themselves to be so easily fooled.
The most important item on the national agenda is the failure to hold free, fair and credible elections. Is ED going to blame Goba for that too????
But investors also raised concerns about the election and infighting over facilitating investment between factions linked to Mnangagwa and Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, the army general who led the coup against Mugabe.
ReplyDeleteThe biggest obstacle is the chronic cash shortages that prevent businesses from importing the goods they need or repatriating the profits they hope to make, while portfolio investors can't get their money out of the stock market.
The only way to convince foreign lenders and investors to provide the funds needed to end the currency crisis is if a financing programme can be agreed with the International Monetary Fund, and that will come with painful terms.
Even before the IMF will engage in talks, it will want to see a free and fair election.
Whoever wins the election won't have long to take the difficult decisions needed to get Zimbabwe's economy back on track before the public optimism built on the back of Mugabe's removal disappears.
By failing to hold free, fair and credible elections President Mnangagwa has made it clear that Zimbabwe is still a pariah state ruled by vote rigging thugs. No foreign investor or lender would want to come to Zimbabwe because they do not like dealing with thugs!
These elections should not be taking place, not without the reforms. If Zanu PF wins everyone knows the party rigged the vote and so has no legitimacy. Even if the opposition was to win, they will still have a very power and cantankerous Zanu PF opposition whose soul-purpose is to be disruptive and make Zimbabwe ungovernable.
It is the opposition's fault for having agreed to go into these flawed elections. MDC failed to implement the reforms when they had the golden opportunity to do so and have since refuse to listen to advice not to go into the election with no reforms.
It is in the best interest for Zimbabwe right now is for these flawed elections to be declared null and void. President Mnangagwa has promised to hold free, fair and credible elections and now, it is clear, he has failed to do so. He and his junta must step aside and allow the appointment of others who will implement the reforms and hold free and fair elections.
@ Linda Masarira
ReplyDelete"Electoral reforms are done by Parliament. We can march and do a whole lot of other things but the only thing that we can do now since the election date was already proclaimed is to push ZEC to act in a fair, transparent and free manner as we go into 2018 elections.
"What is important is as soon as Members of Parliament get into Parliament they are supposed to deal with electoral reforms so that we avoid this last-minute rush for the things that were supposed to be done in five years," said Ms Linda Masarira.
I salute Linda for at least admitting what has been obvious to all except those who are out to deceive the masses or else are blind, deaf and stupid to see even the obvious. People like Tendai Biti and Chamisa, who are leading the deception from the front, know MDC had its best chance to implement the reforms during the GNU. Mugabe bribed them with the trappings of high office and for five years they were hooked and wasted that chance.
The only other way to get any reforms implemented was for them to boycott the elections until reforms were implemented. But once again Zanu PF has dangled the carrot in the form of winning a few gravy train seats. It is these scraps opposition politicians were after in 2013 and again this year.
Chamisa & co. could not jolly well tell their followers they are participating in these flawed elections out of greed. They could not deny that without reforms Zanu PF would rig the elections either. So, they have settled for the lie that they can pressure Zanu PF to implement the reforms even now, just a few weeks before the elections. When one's followers have no clue what the reforms are about, it is easy to bamboozle them.
"The only thing we can do now since the election date was already proclaimed is to push ZEC to act in a fair, transparent and free manner as we go into 2018 elections!" said Linda. I had saluted her far too soon!
The unreformed ZEC is but a department of Zanu PF in all but name and the commissioners' primary task is to make sure Zanu PF, by hook or by crook, deliver a landslide victory for Zanu PF being "fair, transparent and free" is a luxury they can ill afford. The only thing we ca do right now is to make sure SADC and the other international community members are left in any doubt that ordinary Zimbabweans did not want these elections without reforms. Now that elections have been forced upon us, the only outcome we want is for the elections to be ruled null and void.
There is nothing to be gained by participating in these flawed!
"Next week is decisive if ZEC fails to implement reforms, no one will return home as we will sleep in the streets, either at ZEC or here at Africa Unity Square," said Chamisa.
ReplyDelete"Everyone will bring blankets to put up in the CBD until we are heard. It is going to be a national demonstration too as we will mobilise those from the rural."
He added; "(Mnangagwa) will lose sleep over this issue of the ballot.
"If there is no movement, it means no sleeping at home. Over the years we have lost everything, but we are now prepared to protect our vote and our integrity."
Chamisa has promised his followers that MDC would force Zanu PF, "kicking and screaming", as Mwonzora once said, to implement the reforms to ensure the elections are free and fair. This was the basis for MDC participating in these elections which they readily acknowledge will be rigged if reforms are not implemented. Chamisa knew MDC will never get Zanu PF to implement any reforms, they made the claim because it is in the MDC DNA to grandstand and because the party needed an excuse to justify why it is participating in flawed elections.
Sadly, time has run out for MDC. What meaningful reforms can be implemented now, just three weeks before voting day. Even on the ballot; they have been printed and those entitled to postal votes have received the ballots and voted, as we all know.
Yes, MDC leaders, leading from the front, can camp in Africa's Unity Square but this is just another grandstanding gesture that will accomplish nothing. After camping in the street Chamisa and company WILL decamp and still go out and participate in these elections by voting.
Mr Chamisa you and your MDC friends had five years during the GNU to implement the reforms which would have guaranteed free, fair and credible elections for 2013 and thereafter forever. You did not implement even one reform. Not one! Now you want the nation to believe you're your sleeping in Africa Unity Square will "protect our vote and our integrity!" You can fool you naïve and gullible followers but not everyone, even your followers must be finding all this nonsense hard to digest!
There are those who chose to see the removal of Mugabe as all the nation needed to do to end the economic meltdown and hit the high tones of economic prosperity. They took to President Mnangagwa's "Zimbabwe is open for business!" like a duckling to water. Well, a duckling was water repellent feathers and webbed feet, they do not.
ReplyDeleteZimbabwe has not been open for business for decades because the country was a pariah state ruled by corrupt, incompetent and vote rigging thugs. The removal of Mugabe and a few around him was a good start but it was not enough to change the country's status particularly when most of the thugs remained in power. The Zanu PF dictatorship was under new management but otherwise nothing had changed.
"Even before the IMF will engage in talks, it will want to see a free and fair election. The opposition protested this week, saying the electoral process was being rigged, with ballot papers being printed without their participation," reported Reuters.
This regime's failure to hold free, fair and credible elections has settled the question that the dictatorship has not changed!
Investors do not do business with thugs, period! The flood of investors some people were cocksure was coming soon after the coup has not materialised; reality is sinking in.
We have known that these elections would be rigged unless the democratic reforms are implemented. SADC leaders told Morgan Tsvangirai not to go into the election without reforms. The real question here is: "Why has the opposition refused to listen to the common-sense advice!"
ReplyDeleteIt is nonsensical that the opposition should decide, against sound advice, to participate in these flawed and illegal elections and then morn that the elections are being rigged!
The nation is being dragged into these elections because both Zanu PF and the MDC want the elections to go ahead. The former knows by rigging the elections the regime is assured of its iron grip on power. To entice the MDC to take part in the flawed elections, Zanu PF is offering a few gravy train seats; it is these scraps the opposition are after.
The opposition maintain they are making "the most" of the rigged elections. Other than getting the scraps what good has come out of their participating. If anything, they are giving the flawed process credibility by participating, as David Coltart, MDC senator and minister in the GNU has acknowledged.
"The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn't now do the obvious - withdraw from the (2013) elections," you wrote.
"The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility."
What SADC and the rest of the international community must understand is that the ordinary Zimbabweans did not want these flawed elections to go ahead, not without reforms. The people have gained nothing from these rigged elections. They have lost everything, instead; their right to a meaningful vote, they are stuck with a corrupt and tyrannical regime, they have forfeited one chance after another to implement the reforms and end this madness, etc.
What the people of Zimbabwe are asking of the international election observers in Zimbabwe is for them to declare these elections null and void. This will open the door for Zimbabwe to revisit the raft of democratic reforms agreed at the onset of 2008 GNU and to appoint an interim administration whose principal task will be to implement the reforms.
VICE President Constantino Chiwenga yesterday promised residents of Harare's oldest suburb modern apartments with swimming pools as Zanu PF stepped up its campaign to wrestle control of the capital from the opposition.
ReplyDeleteThe people of Mbare have been denied something as basic as clean running water, an opportunity to earn a decent living, etc. Now they are being promised modern apartments with swimming pools and bullet trains to wiz them their ultra-modern cities and towns to their ultra-modern rural homes complete with spaghetti junctions!
The Zanu PF politicians can afford to promise anything they can imagine; they know they will never be held to democratic account, not when one has carte blanche powers to rig the elections.
MDC politicians too can afford to promise the moon on a silver platter they too know they will never be held to democratic account, they know Zanu PF is rigging the elections and they will never get into power. They are just content with the few gravy train seats Zanu PF is giving away to reward them for participating and giving the flawed process credibility.
@ TJINGABABILI
ReplyDeleteTrue. Zanu PF is rigging these elections, they are going through the motions of holding rallies, producing a manifesto, etc. to give the impression these are democratic elections. By participating in the flawed elections, MDC is playing a vital role of giving the process credibility. Zanu PF is rewarding Chamisa and company for this service by allowing them to win a few gravy train seats!
Members of the Movement for Democratic Change' s Veteran Activists Association yesterday honoured fallen cadres who were allegedly murdered by Zanu PF supporters in 2008.
ReplyDeleteThe greatest honour these fallen heroes would want is for the nation to have free, fair and credible elections. This has not happened because MDC leaders sold-out on implementing the reforms during the GNU. The village idiots continue to sell-out by participating in these flawed elections, knowing fully well Zanu PF is rigging the vote.
Since the 2008 elections, Zanu PF has shown that it has carte blanche powers to rig the vote and stay in power regardless of how the ordinary object. The whole point of the 2008 to 2013 GNU was for it to implement the democratic reforms designed to take away these carte blanche powers. MDC leaders failed to get even one reform implemented because they took their eyes off the ball. Mugabe bribed them with the trappings of high office, the ministerial limos, the generous salaries and allowance, a $4 million mansion for Tsvangirai, etc. and, in return, MDC leaders forgot about the reforms.
ReplyDeleteSADC leaders have made it clear that Zimbabwe should not go into the elections without first implementing the reforms. "If you go into the elections next month, you will lose; the elections are done!" they warned Tsvangirai and the other MDC leaders in 2013. As we all know MDC leaders paid no heed.
Chamisa is saying he will not "go" into the 30 July elections, but will not boycott the elections either - an oxymoron, of course - unless MDC agrees in the ballot. Even if this condition was met we all know that this will do nothing to guarantee free, fair and credible elections.
Instead of MDC implementing the reforms to ensure free and fair elections the party is now helping Zanu PF get away with rigged elections by insisting in participating in flawed and illegal elections. It is not enough to denounce Zanu PF for rigging the elections and saying nothing about how MDC is helping them to get away with it.
We must demand that these flawed elections must be declared null and void here and now and not wait until the result are out. We must demonstrate that we do not approve of these elections going ahead with out first implementing the reforms by saying so and refuse to have anything to do with the whole sorry process.