of the former Registrar-General of Voters and those of the
Commission; and
(c) the resolution of any disputes whatsoever that may arise
between the Commission and the former Registrar-General
of Voters; and
(d) Mandatory automatic and electronic voter registration.
Section 3
Section 6
The amendment to section 19 of the Principal Act clearly spells out
that voter registration shall be conducted by the Commission
through its voter registration officers (who shall be employees of
the Commission and who may be appointed to this office
conjunctively with any other office as an electoral officer) or any
persons whom the Commission may from time to time appoint to
assist in voter registration.
4. In section 20 a new paragraph (a) substitutes the current
Section 20(2)(a) to read as follows: "(a) the voter's first and last
names, date of birth, national registration number and sex;
- This Section repeals section 26 of the Principal Act and
introduces a new section that sets out information that
use of the words, “after consultation.” This is bizarre considering
that the regulations may affect the operations of ZEC, which is
supposed to be an independent, impartial body. The minister is not,
and is invariably a political contestant during an election period. The
Act cannot introduce provisions that potentially undermine the
independence, impartiality and effectiveness of the Commission
- Thirdly the retention of the role of the RGV is worrying. As already
pointed out above, there is no place for the RGV under the current
constitutional dispensation
- The minister and the RGV should have no role in the management of
elections. What would be sensible and in accordance with the law, is
to give the law-making powers, in terms of regulations and rules, to
ZEC itself as the only constitutionally mandated body to conduct
elections
There seems to be a drafting error as the amendment introduces a new
Section 19 to the Principal Act but without indicating that it is repealing the
old section 19. A reading of the Amendment suggests that Section 19 in the
Amendment Act should replace the one in the Principal Act. The new Section
19 reflects the letter and spirit of Section 239 of the Constitution as it makes
it clear that voters’ registration is to be Conducted by the Commission
through its voter registration officers. This is progressive and reflects the
spirit of the Constitution. The concern here is that the provision allows for
the Commission to, ‘appoint persons from time to time to assist in voter
registration.’ It may have been desirable to indicate certain requirements for
such persons in order to ensure that they are persons who can impartially
discharge such duties to the threshold set by the Constitution .For example it
would be undesirable to appoint persons who are in the security sector for
these purposes, given their tainted role in previous election processes.
The slight change is the addition of sex to the disaggregated data.
This is a useful data component to collect in order to analyse the
voters’ roll pattern from a gender lens.
- The new section 26 gives greater detail in relation to the
information on the voters’ registration certificate. This