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Voters Roll Audit of Preliminary Voters Roll Mar 2005 Election - Final Report
FreeZim Support Group
March 22, 2005

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Notes

• This report is submitted before the complete roll could be audited so that the findings can be made public and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission is made aware of the problems prior to elections being held on 31^st March 2005.
• The difficulties in gaining access to the voters roll from the Registrar General cannot be over emphasized.

Key Indicators

1. An inflated voters roll gives the opportunity to manipulate votes and "stuff" ballots without the percentage turnout being absurd or impossible.
2. Deceased persons still on the roll gives the opportunity for a corrupt regime to use the deceased persons ID to gain extra votes.
3. Duplicate ID numbers can be used as duplicate votes.

The aforementioned are 3 key factors in a court case pending in the Zimbabwe High Court (lodged in April 2002 and still pending) where the validity of the results of the Presidential Elections are being challenged.

When (if) the case is heard it will be proved beyond all doubt that the factors (a) (b) & (c) above were extensively used to rig the elections BUT as the case is still subject to the courts hearing the FACTS cannot be disclosed at this juncture. However it is noted that to date the Registrar General (who is now in contempt of court) has still failed to comply with court orders allowing the inspection of documents as required by law and the question as to WHAT is being hidden MUST be asked.

Introduction
The roll being the cornerstone of the democratic "one person – one vote" system it is necessary for the roll to be accurate and up to date otherwise the democratic principal is negated from the very beginning of the electoral process. The results of the year 2000 General Elections and the year 2002 Presidential Elections indicated that there could be massive fraud and irregularities in the Zimbabwe Voters Roll which has prompted this investigative research and report. It must be made explicitly clear that from the onset the investigations have been extremely difficult to carryout because of obstruction and non cooperation from the Registrar General and his department who have custody of the nation’s voters-roll and other population related data. In January 2002 the RG was compelled by a High Court Order to hand over a digital copy of the provisional voters roll just before the Presidential Elections in March of that year – this digital roll is used as the "Bench Mark".

To do an effective analysis of the roll and electoral results it is necessary to have the data in electronic format ( as is the form that the RG now keeps the data ) so that computers can be programmed to eliminate the time consuming checks and crosschecks that are required in an analysis. With the RG’s refusal to release the roll in such form and supported by obscure judgements from the Supreme Court it became necessary for the digitisation of the roll by electronic means, but first the paper copy had to be obtained.

It took nearly two years and countless requests to obtain a roll from the RG in spite of the fact that the Law is very specific in that the roll must be readily and freely available to any person. The writer was banned from viewing the roll and the Registrar general has to date not replied to 7 letters written asking for valid reasons for the ban.

This report reveals the findings that clearly indicate that the voters roll requires extensive repair prior to any democratic election at any level be undertaken and that it is the duty of the newly appointed Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to ensure that it is done.

Executive Summary
A copy of the roll was obtained in October 2004 from the Registrar General after the initial application had been made in April 2002.

A summary of the roll was done that indicated incomprehensible voting registration patterns that are in direct conflict with the 2002 Census and highlighted in a report by F Matarise of the University of Zimbabwe.

Scanning and computer equipment was obtained and digitisation started in November 2004.

The digitising of the rolls resulted in 14 rolls being completed totalling 602920 voters being included in the database.

The "sample" of well over 10% of the reported roll and analysed to date is considered statistically representative by international standards. It is through detailed data and statistical analysis of these rolls that the following key findings are presented.

Analysis shows that over 2 million of the 5,6 million names registered as voters are highly suspect. Removing these from the roll results in the recently completed delimitation reports changing of constituency boundaries as being highly questionable and will significantly effect the pending General Elections.

• Deceased persons remaining on the roll extrapolated to over 1 million.
• Over 300 000 duplicate names exist on the roll.
• Over One million names of people appearing on the roll are fictitious in that they no longer reside at the registered address.
• As a consequence of the forgoing the delimitation process is significantly effected.
• The forging will also result in absurd voting statistics as well as to give the opportunity to "stuff" votes.

The following table gives the extent of "damage" extrapolated from the sample analysed to date and that can be expected to be substantiated when the rest of the digitisation and analysis is completed.

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