The by-election was poorly contested. ZESN is not aware of any campaign rallies or meetings that the FFP held during the campaign period. It appears that FFP campaigns were only limited to putting up posters throughout the Constituency, most of which were defaced by suspected ZANU-PF supporters, a development which demonstrates the existence of a culture of intolerance to opposing political viewpoints, by some supporters of the ruling party. According to the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Authority; ZEC officials last heard of the party’s candidate Rodwell Nyanganya on nomination day2. This media report is consistent with feedback that ZESN received from members of the public which ZESN observers interacted with before polling day. Polling station based voter registration was conducted throughout the constituency, in accordance with the law; however the ZEC continues to create two separate voters’ rolls. The main roll consists of the voters who presented themselves at the registration centres while the supplementary roll contains all the names of individuals who were on the 2013 voter’s roll for the same constituency, but who did not participate in the voter registration exercise for this by-election. Recommendations: i. ii. iii. iv. ZESN recommends that ZEC comes up with a more comprehensive voter registration methodology that ensures that all eligible voters are captured by the new polling station based voter registration system. ZEC should consider piloting the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) in future byelections as it prepares to introduce the system in 2018, the adoption of BVR will go a long way in enhancing transparency and integrity of the voter registration processes in Zimbabwe. ZEC should devise voter education programmes that lure the youth to fully participate in electoral processes as the level of participation of youths in electoral processes remains low. Political parties must ensure that they train and deploy election agents to all polling stations to enable them to comment authoritatively on the electoral processes in Zimbabwe. The recommendations above can only be fulfilled when there is adequate political will and commitment by the political actors in Government. 2 http://www.zbc.co.zw/index.php/news-categories/local-news/66211-thousands-vote-in-mhondoro-mubaira 6|P a g e