ZESN Report on the 31 July 2013 Harmonised Elections When the exercise ended on 19 May 2013, there was much criticism that it was inadequate and did not capture all those interested in registering. To address these concerns and abide by a requirement of the new Constitution, a new exercise was conducted from 10 June to 9 July. Improvements were noted, including more publicity and the deployment of at least two voter educators per ward, unlike the previous exercise when there were only two educators per district. Civil society groups were not accredited to provide voter education, which remained inadequate. Registration requirements were also relaxed. Previously, applicants had been required to supply proof of residence, such as utility bills or confirmation from parents or landlords. For the purposes of the second exercise, applicants were required to sign affidavits confirming their addresses at the respective registration centre. Long queues developed during this exercise due to the slow processing of applicants by officials. There was also a preference to register police recruits first, who were bussed in to many registration centres. Despite the original plans to have a team in each ward for 30 consecutive days, due to funding constraints, registration was done for 2-3 wards simultaneously and for only 3-4 days. Many people therefore failed to register, including those who were employed and could not take time off to register when the registration teams were in their ward during the week. Time constraints created by the declaration of the election date also obliged the electoral authorities to compromise normal electoral procedure by combining the voter registration exercise with the inspection of the voters’ roll. This was unlike previous elections and normal electoral practice in many countries. As a result, newly registered voters had no chance to check whether their names appeared on the voters’ roll because the roll was only compiled after the end of the registration exercise and inspection period. The consequences of this were abundantly apparent on the actual Election Day when hundreds of thousands of voters were turned away from polling stations for various reasons, including the fact that they had turned up to vote in the wrong ward. Some were even turned away despite holding voter registration slips as proof of registration. The change from constituency to ward-based voters’ rolls was not well communicated to voters, and this resulted in many people being turned away from polling stations where they had voted in previous elections. This was because whilst the polling station was in the right constituency it was not in the ward where the voter was registered. Although the processes of registration and inspection were combined, the element of inspection was not well publicised. As a result, many people did not go to inspect the roll and therefore did not find out the exact ward they were registered. Although the unofficial myzimvote.com website made it possible for citizens to ‘inspect’ the roll online, this service was only available to those with access to the Internet, a tiny fraction of the electorate. It was also disowned by the electoral authorities, who advised citizens to physically check at its overcrowded local registration centres. Another problem was the fact that although this private website provided a valuable public service for many potential voters, it could not provide an up-to-date voters’ roll. The website was, in fact, declared illegal by the Registrar-General Voters’ office. 29 | P a g e