likely to carry out their duties in a politically biased fashion. There is apprehension that any fraudulent rigging of results could be carried out by military and intelligence personnel at the Joint Operational Command Centre. According to the new electoral laws, the main source of administrative staff for the elections should be public servants, government health personnel and personnel from local government bodies. However, as government teachers and nurses are presently on strike a large number of persons who could have been used may not be available. There is a danger therefore that, despite the prohibition against this, security personnel may be called in to assist in administrative capacities. The Mugabe government refused entirely reasonable pleas to delay elections to allow adequate time to prepare properly for the complex multi-vote elections. Because of this the preparations for the upcoming elections have been very rushed and completely unsatisfactory. ZEC has had inadequate capacity to perform its various functions. The electoral law requires that voter education commence 90 days before the election. ZEC's voter education programme started far too late and has been poorly conducted. Its educational materials have contained fundamental errors. For instance, it had to issue a correction to the contents of one of its pamphlets that erroneously stated that voters had to produce proof of residence before they could vote and that persons requiring assistance to vote would be assisted by police officers. Despite its lack of capacity to conduct an effective voter education programme, ZEC has barred an NGO with vast experience in voter education from conducting its own voter education programme. Voter education is particularly important for the forthcoming elections because each voter will be expected to cast four votes (for the President, a Member of the House of Assembly, a Senator and a local authority councillor) and will have to cast those votes in the ward in which he or she is registered. Voters will therefore have to ascertain in which ward in which constituency they are registered. The wards have been substantially altered as a result of the new delimitation so voters cannot assume that they will be able to vote in the same wards they voted in previously. Regrettably, ZEC allowed only a short space of one week for inspection of the voters’ rolls. This means that many registered voters will not know in which ward they must vote, and by the time they find out on polling day, the voting process may have been finished. Only persons registered on the ward voters’ roll are entitled to vote. However, if a person’s name does not appear on the roll, that person will still be entitled to vote if he or she produces to the presiding officer a voters’ registration certificate issued to him or her, so long as the certificate shows that the person was registered not later than 24 hours before the nomination day (14 February). It is important that observers keep a close eye on the production of these registration 15