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Leonard Ncube in Victoria Falls

BY-ELECTIONS get underway on Saturday morning and aspiring local government candidates in Victoria Falls have said the campaign period was peaceful.

The country embarks on by-elections tomorrow in 117 local government and 28 National Assembly seats.

Victoria Falls will have by-elections in wards 1 and 6 where former councillors Marguerite Varley and Ephias Mambume respectively, were recalled by their opposition MDC party.

The local authority has 11 wards and all were won by MDC Alliance councillors in 2018.

Zanu-PF is fielding Cde Tonderai Mutasa in ward 1 who is battling it out with Mr Christopher Ndiweni of Citizens Coalition Change (CCC).

In ward 6, Zanu-PF’s Cde Bekithemba Mlotshwa is up against CCC’s Derrick Munsaka and Zapu’s Brian Ndlovu.

Speaking at the Victoria Falls Press Club on Thursday evening, some of the candidates said generally the campaign period was peaceful although there were some incidents of tearing of campaign posters for some of them.

Cdes Mlotshwa and Mutasa of Zanu-PF as well as CCC’s Mr Ndiweni attended the presser while Mr Munsaka excused himself as he was at work.

Mr Ndlovu did not turn up after promising to attend and his phone was switched off.

The three candidates said they were geared for tomorrow’s polls and promised to usher change in the local authority’s governance system if voted for.

They said they had fair coverage from the media during their campaigns which involved holding rallies, door to door visits and distributing fliers.

The candidates said they had access to the voters roll and were happy that it had been updated although some voters relocated because of Covid-19 effects.

“The campaign went on well and people received us well. We visited all houses in ward 6 excluding those for the two other candidates where they stay. We put posters in the whole of ward 6 and distributed fliers. We also held rallies and a sports tournament,” said Cde Mlotshwa.

“It’s been very peaceful and we didn’t have any incidents of violence. What we have been doing is try by any means to avoid contact with other candidates’ campaign programmes so that our supporters could not have confrontation.”

Cde Mutasa said: “The campaign went well and was peaceful. We managed to visit and meet the electorate although ward 1 is a bit sensitive to gatherings. Media coverage was fair although we could have done better by doing things that attract the media. I saw the voters roll and it was updated. The major challenge was Covid-19 because many people relocated and it was a hustle to trace and identify them. Luckily, we managed to identify some.”

Mr Ndiweni Christopher Ndiweni said he adhered to electoral laws during his campaign but faced challenges with residents in the low-density suburb.

“Ward 1 is a rainbow ward with various cultures. It is fragile in the sense that people there don’t want noise so for me the campaign environment was not conducive. So we were only distributing fliers and putting posters on trees. We followed all regulations but some residents would come and complain that we were making noise and some of the posters were teared which is why I am saying I did not have a conducive environment,” he said.

-@ncubeleon