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The country is firmly on the road to the next harmonised election, likely to be staged in August.

Preparations are gathering momentum across the board. Political parties are getting ready to compete with the obvious goal of emerging the winners. The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) is also at work having started it in earnest, we can say, soon after the publishing of the results of the April 2022 national housing and population census in July of that year. The census report says there are 15,1 million people in the country, 16,2 percent more than during the 2012 national census. Soon after the release of that document, Zec launched a national constituency delimitation exercise that ended with the gazetting by the Government, of the final report on February 20 this year.

As it prepares for the election, Zanu-PF has been on the ground, meticulously verifying its members at cell level, the party’s smallest but most important structure to which all its members belong. President Mnangagwa said on Thursday that the party will stage its primary elections nationwide on Saturday next week.

On its part, Zec will tomorrow begin a 10-day mobile biometric voter registration campaign at 4 474 points countrywide. The exercise, the final one before polling day, could result in the voter population increasing from about 5,8 million citizens who are already on the voters’ roll. Zec said in a release on Thursday that the public should present a national identity card (metal, plastic or waiting pass) with the holder’s picture when going to register. If they do not have an ID, a valid Zimbabwean passport can work. Prospective registrants must bring proof of residence as well.

National ID

Only Zimbabwean citizens who are 18 years and older qualify to register. Persons whose national IDs are inscribed “ALIEN” who are eligible to register should have long birth certificates indicating they were born in or outside Zimbabwe.

However, Zec said the birth certificates should indicate that one of their parents are citizens of Zimbabwe or they were born in Zimbabwe, and one or both of their parents are citizens of a Sadc country, and that they were ordinarily resident in Zimbabwe on the day of the publication of the Constitution on 22 May 2013.

Speaking at an event in Bocha, Manicaland on Wednesday, the President indicated the election could be held in August.

Photo Credit: iStockphoto

Indeed, the nation is surely moving towards the huge, quinquennial exercise that tests the nerves, rewards the pro-people, condemns the anti-people while giving citizens an opportunity to elect those they want to lead them for the next five years.

But for them to vote, citizens’ names must appear on the voters’ roll, and for their names to appear on that register, they must personally, physically present themselves before Zec officials with the required documentation to register as voters.

Therefore, we implore eligible citizens to use the next 10 days to register to vote. As indicated, this will be the final exercise before polling day, so compatriots must do the needful.

President Mnangagwa

We want all those who are eligible to vote to be able to exercise their democratic right to elect those they want to lead them, so that our democracy can continue to improve. It costs nothing to register to vote, just a walk or drive to a centre that Zec, as usual, will set up at convenient places, and a bit of time as officers take down their details. But the benefits that come with voting, the sense of self-worth and that of playing a role in the governance of one’s country are much more beneficial than that walk or drive and the few minutes citizens will take to register as voters. So we urge compatriots to go out and register to vote.