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Media coverage for the 2008 elections: June 14th - August 28th 2007
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
May 26, 2008

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Introduction
The media, as the Fourth Estate, play a critical role in any democracy and no less so during elections, an integral part of the democratic process. It is mainly through the media that the electorate learns about important information relating to electoral processes, such as voter registration, the inspection of the voters' roll and where to vote.

This report seeks to assess how the Zimbabwean print and electronic media covered the mobile voter registration exercise in preparation for the 2008 consolidated parliamentary, presidential and local government elections. The paper covers the period from 14 June 2007 (when the Registrar-General, Tobaiwa Mudede announced the date for the start of the exercise) to 28th August 2007.

The paper aims to answer the following broad questions:

1. Did the media adequately inform the electorate about the start of the exercise, its duration, and documentation required?
2. Did the media publicise the dates and places of the mobile registration teams?
3. Did the media seek regular updates from the Registrar-General's office?
4. Did the media conduct an audit of the exercise to assess transparency?

Sadly for the Zimbabwean electorate, the public and private media paid little or no attention to the exercise and even completely ignored glaring irregularities in the process. Only the civil society election performance watchdog organisation, Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) provided informative regular weekly updates on the exercise and exposed many of these irregularities, such as the fact that the Registrar-General's office in Bulawayo told a ZESN observer who wanted to transfer from Harare Central constituency that "the office was not registering voters", even though the law provides for continuous voter registration. In fact, Justice Minister, Patrick Chinamasa, confirmed this fact and said the mobile registration exercise had been conducted "for the purpose of (re)drawing constituency boundaries." (ZTV, 22/08, 8pm). The broadcaster did not question the minister on this statement, particularly in view of the changes proposed in the number of constituencies, and none of the independent media followed this up either.

ZESN deployed observers at many registration centres set up around the country who provided valuable information on the progress of the exercise and analysis of its execution. However, the media failed to take advantage of this unique service and so only a few citizens who had access to the ZESN reports acquired a good knowledge of the process.

The national public broadcaster, ZBC has bureau chiefs all over the country and therefore could also have provided regular updates and analysis of the process. It did not do so.

While all media have some responsibility to cover important electoral processes adequately, the public media (whose mandate is to provide adequate, fair, balanced and unbiased information for public consumption) has a primary responsibility to their audiences to fulfill this duty, particularly relating to electoral issues and therefore the voter registration exercise. However, this should not exonerate the private media, because the electoral process is not only a fundamental component of democracy, it is also in the national interest - and particularly so when the public media fail to provide this important information.

The private media even failed to question the Registrar-General's office on the state of the voters' roll, which is generally recognized as having been in a "shambolic" state for previous polls, especially the 2005 parliamentary election and the two national elections preceding it. This was despite the fact that the Registrar-General had admitted his office was "unprepared" to issue identification cards, in particular to individuals attaining voting age. (Daily Mirror, February 22, 2007).

The media should have at least followed up on this to determine whether the Office had the resources to conduct the mobile registration exercise effectively at the time of its inception, including the inspection of the rolls.

Announcing the start of the voter registration exercise
The Registrar-General, Tobaiwa Mudede, announced the dates of the exercise on June 14, 2007 at a news conference in Harare.

All ZBC stations carried the announcement but made no attempt to provide any useful information about which areas the registration exercise would be visiting or what would be needed to register. They merely summarized Mudede's address at the news conference. For example, Spot FM (14/06, 8pm) announced, "The Registrar-General's office has launched a nationwide mobile registration exercise, which kicks off on Monday next week."

In contrast, Studio 7 (15/06) did seek independent analysis by quoting ZESN's national director, Rindai Chipfunde-Vava, who observed that the "process was flawed because it is starting late and was not well-publicised."

The print media largely ignored the event, except for The Herald (15/06), which announced that, "Preparations for next year's joint presidential and parliamentary elections are gathering momentum with mobile registration of eligible new voters, including those who have changed constituencies since the last poll and inspection of the voters' roll beginning next week."

The report gave details of the requirements for one to register as a voter: national ID card, a waiting pass with a picture of the individual, or a valid passport. It also stated that drivers' licences would not be accepted.

The rest of the private print media displayed acute fatigue, as they did not carry any follow-ups to the announcement even though they carried generic advertisements inserted by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) urging people to go and register.

The Zimbabwean (June 21-27) only carried a response to news of the exercise from the opposition MDC; " . . . the . . . MDC has dismissed the voter registration process started by the Registrar-General, describing it as a violation of democratic principles . . . " but did not explain the reasons for this condemnation.

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