The die has been cast, as Zimbabwe goes to polls without reforms

By Youngerson Matete 

President Emmerson D. Mnangagwa, this week, through a gazette, announced that Zimbabwe will go to the polls on Wednesday, the 23rd of August 2023 to elect the next President, members of parliament and local authorities (councilors) for the country. 

The declaration of the election date by the President means that Zimbabwe will go to elections without a single electoral or political reform as the electoral reform bill, HB 11 of 2022 was still being debated before the parliament. This means that the electoral reform bill is no longer applicable to this general elections according to section 157(5) of the constitution of Zimbabwe which clearly states that, "after an election has been called, no change to the Electoral Law or to any other law relating to elections has effect for the purpose of that election."

The background and battle for reforms in Zimbabwe 

Since 2000, Zimbabwe has been battling with a political crisis emanating from disputed elections which have been generally marred by political violence, vote rigging claims, vote buying and a host of other rampant electoral malpractices.

The disputed elections have led many political stakeholders both local, regional and international interest groups calling for both political and electoral reforms in Zimbabwe if the country is to have a free, fair and credible elections. 

After the 2018 harmonized elections, various local, regional and international Election Observer Missions (EOMs) that observed the July 30 elections put forward around 223 recommendations that could help strengthen Zimbabwe’s electoral processes following yet another disputed presidential election result that sparked violence in the streets of Harare on the 1st of August 2018.

5 years down the line, Harare didn't implement even a single reform from the 223 which were recommended by the electoral observer missions in 2018, Instead, it has enacted some draconian laws and amended the constitution. Come 23, August 2023, Zimbabwe will most likely head into another disputed elections.

The importance of electoral reforms to Zimbabwe 

After the November 2017 military coup or as some like to call it, a military assisted transition in Zimbabwe, President ED Mnangagwa who took over from long time ruler Robert G Mugabe enjoyed both local and international goodwill after he had managed to charm Britain with his promise to implement electoral reforms in Zimbabwe.

International doors were slowly being opened for the ZANU-PF led government by many Western countries as Mr. Mnangagwa pushed his engagement and re-engagement foreign policy in an attempt to bring Zimbabwe back into the global community after a long time in the wilderness.

The 2018 elections dispute that led to the death of six civilians in the hands of the military on August 1 created a legitimacy crisis for ZANU-PF and President ED Mnangagwa that negatively affected the government’s engagement and re-engagement policy as Nelson Chamisa and the then MDC Alliance refused to recognize the government of ED Mnangagwa. The prospects of the engagement and re-engagement policy suffered a huge setback since then and has been dealt a major blow by the continuous violation of human rights by the government of President Mnangagwa back home. The continuous harassment of journalists, opposition political activists and civil society leaders led the international community to question the sincerity of Harare.

To this date, the ZANU-PF government still desires to be part of the international community as evidenced by their strong push to join the commonwealth which the ZANU-PF government have been repeatedly told that the only way to become part of that community is through reforms, opening of the democratic space and holding free and fair elections as charity begins at home.

What are some of the reforms which have been clamored for?

Zimbabweans have been clamoring for political, electoral and administrative reforms to avoid another disputed elections which has left the country in isolation leading to a severe economic crisis that has left almost 80% of its population in poverty. 

There is no doubt that the country and the SADC region can no longer afford disputed elections with South Africa, that has provided greener pastures for troubled Zimbabweans for decades now in a crisis of its own as well. 

The ANC government in South Africa has repeatedly shown support of the ZANU-PF government and have failed to pressure it to institute reforms. As a result, a disputed election in Harare is almost unavoidable now but will prove to be too expensive for the region, in particular South Africa. 

Unorganized and incapacitated electoral commission

The disputed delimitation report in January sharply divided the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission in which seven commissioners disassociated themselves with the report. 

The seven rogue commissioners didn't only wrote to the President to ignore the report but even further approached the courts to have it set aside. Although they failed to win on both fronts, the damage had already been done and the division couldn't be healed. This means that Zimbabwe is going for elections with a "sharply" divided electoral management body. 

Furthermore, the commission’s lack of preparedness and incapacitation have been exposed during both the voter registration blitz in March 2023 and the just ended voter inspection exercise which were both marred by chaos and confusion. 

During the voter registration blitz, many registration centers had no registration machines or back up power forcing the exercise to be extended by further five days. It was the same during the voter inspection where many polling stations had no voters roll for voters to check their names.

 It is most likely going to be the same story on the poling day. Many polling stations may get the voting material late which will make it difficult for voters to cast their ballots. Since 2000, electoral stakeholders have been calling for administrative reforms to address some of these issues that have to do with the conduct of the commission. 

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission's lack of independence

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission's independence has always been under question. The body was originally set up as a supervisory commission staffed by government employees and deployed only during elections. It sunk to its lowest depths in 2008 when it failed to declare results for 45 days before claiming a run-off was needed between the late President Mugabe and then opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai (MHSRIP).

In 2013, the Commission was reconstituted as an independent full-time commission, at least on paper, as it still has some of the employees from before. There are also various allegations that it is staffed by security and intelligence operatives associated with the ruling ZANU-PF party. This has put the commission’s integrity into serious disrepute.

The long and short of it is that the current commission has lost legitimacy to run a free and fair election. It is not only compromised but hugely fractured along political factions that exists in the ruling party. The likelihood of the commission overseeing a credible poll is close to nonexistent come 23 August 2023.

Refusal to issue out the voters’ roll in a verifiable and auditable format.

The credibility of an election starts with the credibility of the voters’ roll and the voters’ roll cannot be credible if it has not been availed to political stakeholders and voters to be audited and verified.

The voter's roll is the election manual and if it is not availed to political stakeholders, it is difficult to validate or verify the election results. There can't be a free and fair elections when opposition parties are denied access to a verifiable and auditable voter's roll and only the ruling party is given access to it. 

The situation has been made even worse by the fact that some senior opposition figures and sitting members of parliament who are in parliament by the virtue that they were in the voters roll in 2018 (because in Zimbabwe you can't be a member of parliament if you are not a registered voter) have had their names removed from the voters roll and many voters failed to inspect their names in a chaotic and unorganized voter inspection by the electoral commission.

Since 2000, Zimbabwe’s voters’ roll has been shambolically organised and known to contain the names of large numbers of dead people. In 2013, the voters’ roll, which was not released in time for inspection and verification, became a key source of electoral disputes. In early-2016, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) announced that it would introduce a Biometric Voter Register for the 2018 elections. A clean and reliable database would improve trust and confidence in the system.

In several surveys since 2013, the commission has scored embarrassingly low on trust and the commission's refusal to be transparent undermines its claim that it wants to earn the public’s confidence. Refusing to share the voters roll have made things worse. Its opacity has renewed fears that it could manipulate the database by including the names of dead people, facilitating multiple registration, and deliberately under-registering voters in certain areas.

Disputed electoral boundaries.

On the 20th of February 2023, the president gazetted the delimitation report to officialize new electoral boundaries.

The new electoral boundaries in the delimitation report were heavily gerrymandered and apportioned in contrast to section 161 of the constitution of Zimbabwe which lays down the procedures and intended outcome of the delimitation exercise. 

Many constituencies and wards have a difference that is more than 20% hence failing to affirm the equality of voting strength as envisaged by the constitution that outlines that there must be a difference of not more than 20% between smaller and bigger constituencies or wards. In the delimitation report we now have constituencies and wards which are more than 40% bigger or smaller than others; a clear act of mal-apportionment.

There are also several wards in rural and urban areas which swapped constituencies; a bigger chunk from rural to urban and a small from urban to rural constituencies. ZANU-PF have a strong support base in rural areas so by taking a significant number of wards of their supporters to urban constituencies will dilute the constituencies and give them a chance to win urban constituencies while moving a small number of wards from urban to rural means they preserve their rural constituencies and be in a chance to win urban constituencies. This is a clear exercise of political gerrymandering of boundaries. 

The delimitation report had no polling station names as well. It only consists of codes which are very confusing for political stakeholders and voters to follow. The codes on the map and the delimitation report are not even aligning, some codes even lead to polling stations which were inside the Indian Ocean and some lead to Australia. This is just but a tip on the iceberg of a host of many issues and short comings of the delimitation report.

The secrecy around the ballot paper

Ballot papers are the single most important documents in any election and, for a process to be credible, there must be rigorous control over the number that is printed. If not, extras can easily be produced and used for ballot-stuffing. The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission’s secrecy around the procurement of ballot papers and other electoral materials raises concerns.

The format in which ballot papers are printed must be agreed by all political players, a format that is in the electoral act. In 2018, the commission printed the ballot paper in two columns instead of a single column, to make sure that the name of President Mnangagwa is placed on top of the column. This is because names on the ballot paper are printed alphabetically using last names. If the commission had followed rules, Mr. Mnangagwa’s name would have been buried inside a host of 23 presidential candidates’ names. 

 At best, this approach reveals the commission’s flippant attitude and failure to recognize the importance of building trust in every aspect of the election. At worst, it opens the possibility of a grand plan to influence the outcome.

Balanced coverage from the state media

While private and commercial media channels have a prerogative to cover parties as they wish, the public broadcasting media belongs, and must be accessible, to all. At the moment, however, coverage by state media is biased and unbalanced. ZANU-PF enjoys a disproportionate amount of airtime, including live coverage of President Mnangagwa’s campaign rallies, while the opposition’s activities are largely neglected or portrayed negatively.

 The state media works as an extension communication department of ZANU-PF as it is used to propagate propaganda, political spinning and smear attacks against opposition parties. This is in direct violation of the constitution, which prescribes editorial interference in state media and enjoins public broadcasters to be impartial.

Implementation of universal adult suffrage 

The constitution of Zimbabwe, Section 155 give guiding principles for democratic elections. The constitution makes it clear that there must be adult universal suffrage which simply means that every Zimbabwean must be allowed to vote. This is also strengthened by Section 67 of the Constitution in chapter 4, the bill of rights that extend voting rights to every Zimbabwean without imposing any limits. 

Curiously, the electoral act doesn't provide for the diaspora and prison vote despite the fact that the constitution allows them to enjoy these rights. The irony of the matter is that the commission has refused to implement the diaspora and prison vote claiming that the electoral act doesn't provide for that but acknowledging that the constitution does. They fail to comprehend or respect the supremacy of the constitution enshrined in section 2 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. The electoral act is inconsistent with the constitution and therefore must be declared null and void in that regard.

Partisan practice by traditional leaders and assisted voters.

Traditional leaders have been used to coerce and intimidate rural voters, forcing them to claim that they are not able to write. People are frog marched to vote for ZANU-PF by traditional leaders, a violation of the constitution and traditional leader's act. The traditional leaders have become part of or an extension of ZANU-PF structures. They are now partisan functionaries. 

In a high court judgment of 2018, in a matter against the President of the Chiefs’ Council Fortune Charumbira, Chief Charumbira was found to have violated the constitution when he announced that chiefs and traditional leaders must support ZANU-PF. He was asked to retract his statements publicly but is yet to publicly do so, a contempt of court on its own. 

The ruling party continues to weaponize food aid, agricultural inputs and land. Those who are perceived to be opposition supporters are denied food aid, farming inputs and threatened with evacuation from their traditional and communal land. The rural populace leave in perpetual mode of fear. They are not allowed to vote independently. This is the extent to which ZANU-PF is willing to go to rig the elections.

The confusion surrounding the youth and women’s quotas and ZANU-PF hypocrisy 

The Constitutional Amendment Act No.2 came with the extension of women’s quota in the national assembly after it's duration was coming to an end after two terms as first enshrined in the 2013 Constitution which stated that the women's quota will run for two-5 year terms( from 2013 to 2023). The extended women’s quota also came with some progressive changes that specified that among the 60 women to go to parliament through the quota system some must be women with disabilities and some young women. 

The constitutional Amendment Act No.2 also introduced the youth quota in parliament by reserving 10 seats for young people in parliament through proportional representation. The amendment further provided for 30% women’s quota in local authorities through proportional representation. These were both progressive moves by the government although not adequate to address both youth and women participation in decision making.

Although this has been passed at constitutional level, it has not been operationalized through an enabling legislation in the electoral act. The electoral reform bill HB 11 of 2022 contained some of these provisions to enable operationalization of these quotas. Although the constitution affirms its superiority in section 2 which means youth and women’s quotas might likely be implemented in the coming elections. It still pauses a challenge on how they will be implemented without an enabling act as the constitution only provide a framework not a proper implementation criteria. What is clear is that either way, whether they are implemented or not there will still pause a constitutional and legal crisis such is the consequences of going to elections without enacting the electoral reform bill.

The fact that ZANU-PF will most likely respect the supremacy of the constitution on the women and youth quotas because they think that they benefit from it clearly shows their hypocrisy because for a long time they have failed to respect the supremacy of the constitution by denying diaspora vote despite the fact that it is also permissible in the constitution of Zimbabwe on Section 67 that extends the right to vote to all Zimbabweans without imposing physical or distance limitations. 

In conclusion, Zimbabwe is heading for another disputed elections that will plunge the country into further deep economic and political crisis consequently destabilizing the region further. The region, however, must carry the burden of continuously shoving their heads in the sand when it comes to the Zimbabwean crisis. The regional leaders have continuously treated ZANU-PF with kids’ gloves. 

Until the regional leaders start to realize that disputed elections in Zimbabwe is the root cause of all economic problems the country is facing and a major cause of illegal migration and start addressing the elephant in the room rather than signing the "sanctions mantra', the closer it will be to address the Zimbabwean crisis. They must also realize that the crisis in Harare is no longer a "Zimbabwean" internal affair but a regional affair. Zimbabwe on its own has failed to address its own problems and hence requires a strong regional collective action.

Back home, at best the Zimbabwean people can only get a government of national unity, there is little chance of change. The prospects of an opposition party winning an election which has been hugely rigged in advance are very minimal. It is however not to rule out an opposition win and chance for change but it will take nothing short of a miracle.

Youngerson Matete is a pro-democracy and Human Rights activist, a student of Political Science. He is the founder of Project Vote 263, a youth-led initiative to foster inclusive participatory democracy in Zimbabwe. He writes in his own capacity. His views doesn't not represents any organisation.

Cell : +263 773 622 044

Email: youngmatete0@gmail.com/ director@projectvote263.org.zw