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ZEC urged to embrace all electoral stakeholders
Election Resource Centre
October 11, 2011

The Election Resource Centre (ERC) questions efforts by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to shun external electoral assistance in preparation for the upcoming constitutional referendum and general elections.

This follows the sentiments reportedly expressed by the ZEC Acting Chairperson, Mrs Joyce Kazembe when she said that; "Allowing outsiders to fund the referendum and elections is tantamount to undermining our sovereignty", Mrs Kazembe made the statement after receiving vehicles and equipment from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Harare on the 29th of September 2011.

The ERC is concerned with how issues of sovereignty only come to play when it comes to issues that endeavour to promote capacity building, transparency, accountability and professionalism aimed at ensuring the conduct of acceptably free and fair elections. The mandate of the UNDP is to strengthen democracy through targeted support to electoral institutions, laws and processes with a view to fostering credible elections and inclusive politics, which in all cases has never threatened the sovereignty of all the post-conflict and fragile states that have so far benefited from effective assistance from International Institutions.

In any case, the very reason why citizens vote is to promote socio-economic policies which are responsive to their needs and aspirations which aim at eradicating poverty and expanding their choices. The UNDP and other multilateral institutions such as the IMF and World Bank have many a time offered assistance in health, education and service delivery sectors in Zimbabwe. And more pertinently the institution has played a critical role in sourcing funding for the on-going constitution making process. Indeed such efforts have so far not posed any threat to the sovereignty of Zimbabwe.

Within the region and in recent times, Zambia conducted an election which was viewed by many electoral stakeholders as largely free and fair. An assessment of such an election revealed that the Electoral Commission of Zambia was significantly provided with electoral support to fund critical and costly processes like voter registration, voter education and other related election operations by international partners, chief among them was the UNDP. Such precedence is indeed instructive of the constructive nature of international electoral assistance especially to growing democracies like Zimbabwe.

It is more worrying that such attempts to rebuff possible assistance are being done in the realm of an election management body (ZEC) which is reportedly facing serious resource challenges. Noticing the revived agitation by some leaders of the coalition government to have elections by March 2012, it remains a grave concern whether ZEC is now endowed with the requisite technical, human and financial resources to manage both the culminating referendum to the constitutional reform exercise and the ultimate general elections if ever they are to be held within the first quarter of 2012.

The ERC urges election authorities in Zimbabwe, and indeed parties to the coalition government to embrace well meaning electoral assistance with an over arching goal of building a truly professional, well resourced and adequately competent election administration authority.

In as much as it is imperative for the state to fund its own electoral processes, it should however be noted that Zimbabwe is currently bedevilled by serious financial constraints which are a real threat to ZEC`s capacity to effectively run an election, let alone two elections of similar magnitude, without electoral assistance from internationally recognized institutions like the UNDP. The recent effort by the UNDP signifies the readiness of the international community in assisting Zimbabwe to hold acceptably free and fair elections, a gesture which key electoral stakeholders are encouraged to embrace.

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