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Voters kept in the dark over new constituency boundaries
Tichaona Sibanda, SW Radio Africa
January 30, 2008

http://www.swradioafrica.com/news300108/voters300108.htm

Voters in most rural areas in the country still don't know were to go and cast their votes after the redrawing of new constituency boundaries.

Prosper Mutseyami, a senior official of the MDC in Manicaland said there will be a lot confusion on election day as thousands of people have criss-crossed wards and constituencies. He said people badly affected by this are those mainly in rural areas.

The Zimbabwe Election Commission completed the delimitation of new boundaries in December but new maps and information on the new constituencies have not been made available to the public.

'We have a general election in less than eight weeks time but the ZEC is so under financed they can't print new boundaries or leaflets. All our aspiring MPs, senators and councillors have failed to get all that information,' Mutseyami said. The MDC head of elections, Ian Makone, has described the delimitation exercise as a farce because it is seriously flawed.

The number of parliamentary seats has been increased from 120 to 210. The government claims that over 5,6 million people have been registered to vote and the 210 parliamentary seats will get an average of over 26 000 voters a constituency.

Following the new demarcations, the ZEC announced that Bulawayo province now has 12 constituencies, up from 7. Matabeleland North Province now has 13 constituencies also up from 7, the same as Matabeleland South.

Mashonaland West constituencies jumped from 9 to 22, Midlands from 19 to 28, Manicaland 15 to 26, Mashonaland East 11 to 26, Mashonaland Central 10 to 18, Masvingo 14 to 26 and Harare and Chitungwiza 18 to 29.

On Monday government announced Friday February 8th as the deadline for voter registration and for altering details such as addresses or names. This is also the closing date for the nomination court for all candidates seeking to run in the elections. Centres will be open this weekend.

Those who have already registered should go and inspect the voters' roll to make sure their details are correct. Any discrepancies discovered on the day of the poll will mean they will not be allowed to vote.

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