The Electoral Law must compel ZEC to inform registrants who are removed from the voters’ roll.
Those put on the exclusion list must be notified, and there must be a less cumbersome process for redress.
Access to the final voters’ roll must be guaranteed for all contestants as provided by law, and within a specific time-frame.
Ease of registration in urban areas in view of the lowest registration statistics in Harare and Bulawayo in particular, and in urban areas in general.
There should be more permanent registration centres established and these should be open throughout the electoral cycle.
Copies of the roll must be availed to party agents at polling stations.
There is need for procurement of integrated systems that allow one gadget to be used for multiple purposes, such as enrolling voters, voter verification on Election Day and transmission of results.
The law must provide for the publication of the results of the de-duplication process to enhance transparency. ZEC must focus on continuous voter registration and cleaning of the voters’ roll.
Assessment:
There has not been any movement on the gaps listed above, save for marginal improvements with regards to transparency on the voters roll as the ZEC during 2019 and 2020 by-elections has been displaying the voters roll outside polling stations. However ZEC has been seized with the task of cleaning up the voters roll but the results of such processes has not been made public.
ZESN produced a draft Electoral Amendment Bill which has since been submitted to parliament for consideration. A number of the gaps listed above are included in the Bill, such as provisions requiring the ZEC to inform registrants that are put on the exclusion list, facilitating redress for parties who grievances are related to the voter registration process.
