Zimbabwe’s disenfranchised voters

Zimbabwe’s disenfranchised voters

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• Understanding Mugabe's 'End of History' ideology

• Zimbabwe's winter of discontent

• Zim's presidency and balance of power

• Mugabe's crisis of legitimacy

• Judging Justice Uchena's judgment

• Did they have to die for this?

• Challenging ministers' constititutional authority

• Waiting for Godot

• Mugabe: beware the Ides of March

• The Godfather and the Zanu PF Mafia Part III

• Fallacy of the secret ballot in Zimbabwe

• The significance of Dabengwa's conversion

• Preventing a tyranny of the majority

• Who is imposing whom and why?

• The Tsvangirai-Makoni question: the results

• Can Tsvangirai make the ultimate sacrifice?

• Makoni'sbattle against conspiracy culture

• Makoni and the politics of stability

• The trouble with gifts for the judiciary

• The limits of megaphone central banking

• Makoni, Tsvangirai & Mutambara: wise men from the East?

• Democracy without wealth: the Gordian knot in African politics

• Democracy: Africa's elusive dream?

• A non-human rights perspective of Zimbabwe's collapse

• Zanu PF succession: Mujuru and Mnangagwa in tactical retreat

• Zimbabwe: when the elephants fight, it's the grass that suffers

• Big Joes, Little Joes: Zimbabwe's merchants of disorder

• Politics is for the well fed, an old timer told me in Mbare

• The Godfather and the African Mafia Part II

• The Godfather of the Zanu PF Mafia

• The President's missing clothes

• Confronting Zanu PF's anti-imperialist rhetoric

• South Africa's self-serving quiet diplomacy

• When will Africa demonstrate solidarity with Zimbabweans?

• Do they sleep soundly at night?

• Indepedence: was it worth the sacrifice?

• Judges under pressure: the Madzimbamuto case

• Succession debate a means of control for Mugabe

• Reflections on Ghana's Jubilee

• What happens when politicians fail?

• Fanon and the car as a symbol of progress

• Could change in Britain have impact on Zimbabwe?

• Machiavelli and perils of change in Zimbabwe

• Of rats, donkeys and the CNN story

By Alex T. Magaisa

IF MOST most people were asked to describe the picture that forms in the mind at the mention of the term ‘vote rigging’, they would probably give an account of shady characters in dark glasses, dark coats, operating under cover of darkness busy stuffing ballot boxes, changing figures, shredding and burning documents. That may be so, but, in fact, one simple and less dramatic picture of vote-rigging is that of a system that simply prevents persons from exercising their right to vote.

Zimbabwe’s electoral regime contains a number of features that prevent persons from voting or at the very least, increase the risk of preventing persons from voting. In that way the electoral regime plays a crucially negative role in disenfranchising citizens.

Disenfranchised Diaspora

For a start, an attempt sponsored by Jeff Madzingo, The New Zimbabwe CEO, to challenge the constitutionality of the system which disenfranchises Zimbabweans living out of the country was dismissed by the Supreme Court in March 2005. This effectively cemented the disenfranchisement of a significant number of Zimbabweans who have every right to participate in their country’s electoral process.

In most countries, including SADC countries, efforts are being made to allow citizens abroad to participate in the political process. The Zimbabwe government, in its wisdom, has not been willing to do that. That is probably because the Diaspora population is not viewed as a natural constituency for the ruling Zanu PF party.

Local But Displaced

But there is a more pressing matter, concerning those persons resident and present in Zimbabwe but are likely to be disenfranchised come June 27. These are the people who, by circumstance of the deliberately engineered mayhem, violence and intimidation, have become displaced from their normal homes.

It is reported that thousands of people have been displaced from their homes due to the violence raging in the countryside, especially in the Mashonaland provinces. If these persons are to exercise their right to vote, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) will need to devise a special mechanism for that purpose because the current legislation effectively nullifies their right and leaves them disenfranchised.

It is important to illustrate why there is a great risk of disenfranchisement unless the ZEC intervenes, either to stop the violence and displacement and also to facilitate people’s return to their homes. Alternatively, the ZEC could facilitate their ability to exercise their right, wherever they may be physically situated on June 27.

The Ward-Voting System

The problem commences with the mandatory ward-voting system. The effect of Section 110(3) of the Electoral Act is that the Run-off will be conducted in the same way as the March 29 election. This means that in accordance with Section 56 of the Electoral Act, persons will be required to vote in the wards in which they were registered on the voters’ roll. It states that; ‘(a) every voter registered on a ward voters roll shall be entitled to vote in the ward concerned for a Presidential candidate …’

However, there is a proviso to that section, which states that, a person whose name does not appear on the ward voters roll shall still be entitled to vote upon production to the presiding officer of a voters registration certificate. This is the certificate normally issued to a person when he registers on the voters’ roll. It is therefore highly significant that every voter retains and takes to the polling station the voter’s registration certificate, just in case one’s name does not on the ward voters’ roll.

But these provisions have two important implications:

First, it means that if the person’s name is not on the ward voters’ roll and does not have the registration certificate, he will not be able to vote. This is where the violence and confiscation of voters’ registration certificates or identity documents becomes a key instrument of disenfranchisement.

Second, Section 56(1) (b) of the Electoral Act prohibits a person from voting in a polling station outside the ward in which he is registered as a voter on the ward voters roll. The combined effect of these provisions is that a person can only vote in a polling station located in his ward. Conversely, if the person is outside his ward, he is effectively disenfranchised unless he qualifies for postal voting.

This means that the displaced voters will not be able to cast their votes on June 27 unless there is a legal and practical facility to enable them to do so. These victims of violence have, effectively, been disenfranchised. It demonstrates the effectiveness of preventing people from voting as a rigging tactic.

Is the Ward-Voting System necessary in a Presidential Election?

It is difficult to understand the necessity of requiring persons to vote in their respective wards in an election that is essentially national rather than ward-focussed. One can understand the rationale for the ward-based voting procedure in the March 29 election on the basis that it was a harmonised election in which voters were required to vote not only for the presidency and MPs but also for the councillor of that specific ward. That necessitated the restriction of voters to their respective wards.

However, the same rationale is less justifiable in the case of the run-off election, which only concerns the Presidency, a national rather than ward-based office. People should be able to vote at any place where they may be at the relevant time so long as they can authenticate their identity and eligibility to vote.

ZEC’S Constitutional Mandate

One of the ZEC’s chief constitutional functions under Section 61 (4) (a) of the Constitution is to ‘ensure that those elections and referendums are conducted efficiently, freely, fairly, transparently and in accordance with the law’. The ZEC may argue that the ward-based voting system is vital for efficiency and, indeed, for transparency but it is equally important that the values of fairness and freedom be upheld. The displacement and consequent disenfranchisement does not satisfy these values.

The ZEC should devise cost-effective and practical ways to enable people to vote at any place beyond their respective wards. Ideally, people should vote in their wards and most will do so because it is cost-effective and more convenient for them. But those who, for good reason, are unable to be in their wards should not be unduly prevented from voting by a rigid system that fails to take into account the realities of their situation. That there has been violence and displacement is common knowledge and there is, surely, sufficiently good reason why many voters cannot be in their wards on June 27.

ZEC’s Powers

In fact, this is one instance in which the ZEC’s law-making powers provided for under Section 192 could be put to good use. These regulatory powers have already been used at least twice since March 29, first, when extending the run-off deadline from 21 days to 90 days and second, in prescribing new forms and procedures to be used in the counting and verification of votes on June 27.

To be sure, these powers provide various grounds for abuse. These are, by and large, the same powers that were formerly vested in the President under the notorious Section 158 of the old Electoral Act and were only nominally transferred to the ZEC, whose autonomy remains a subject for debate.

The concerns over these powers notwithstanding, Section 192 (4) empowers the ZEC to, ‘make such statutory instruments as it considers necessary or desirable to ensure that any election is properly and efficiently conducted and to deal with any matter or situation connected with, arising out of or resulting from the election’. It is submitted that the matter concerning the displacement of voters is of critical importance to the proper conduct of the run-off election. For that reason, the ZEC should at least make provision to enable such persons to vote.

There may be concerns that opening the voting system beyond the ward-system will create opportunities for further rigging but surely, enabling voters to exercise their right is of great importance. The system has created a greater moral hazard that by displacing people, they will not be able to participate in the election and that the first, and perhaps most effective way of rigging the election.

Alex Magaisa is based at Kent Law School, UK and can be contacted at wamagaisa@yahoo.co.uk
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