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Zanu
PF refuses to change voters' roll
Henry Makiwa, SW Radio Africa
October 05, 2007
http://www.swradioafrica.com/news051007/votersroll051007.htm
The ruling Zanu
PF party on Thursday dampened growing hopes of free and fair polls
when Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa told parliament that there
would be no new voters roll for next year's harmonised elections.
The move discourages expectations by the opposition that voters
would be re-registered to create a new and transparent voters roll
before the election in March next year.
The Movement
for Democratic Change swiftly opposed the ruling party's position,
accusing Robert Mugabe of plotting to use "a corrupted voters'
roll full of ghost voters" to win elections. The MDC wants
the voters roll re-examined and updated to flush out "ghost
voters" - deceased people who are yet to be struck of the voters'
list. The opposition party claims Mugabe has used the dead for electoral
rigging purposes.
Responding to
questions by MDC legislator Nelson Chamisa in parliament, Chinamasa
said: "There will be no re-registration of voters to create
voters rolls. When you are registered you are registered to a particular
group which is the physical unit area and when they do the delimitation,
whether of wards or constituencies, it is a mere exercise of moving
a whole block or part of the block in order to create a constituency."
Chamisa yesterday said the proposed system would prejudice many
voters and scupper hopes of a free and fair election.
Chamisa said:
"Chinamasa chooses to exhibit unmitigated madness and recklessness
at a time when all Zimbabweans are looking for confidence-building
measures. We are having mediation talks at the moment and we want
to have legitimate free and fair elections under a transparent voters
roll." He added: "The electoral roll is like what a syllabus
is to a student. Zanu PF has kept this as a preserve of its own
in secrecy leading to the use of dead people or ghost voters who
are only resurrected at election time to deliver victory to Zanu
PF."
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