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Election dispute resolution mechanisms
Moyo v President & 4 Ors13
Moyo is the President of the Good Peoples’ Movement. He filed an application for the
extension of the nomination court sitting dates, arguing that the date set was full of
technical flaws. He cited the absence of review of the Political Parties (Finance) Act in so
far as it affected his right to access state funds. He also cited the apparent nonpreparedness of ZEC to conduct the election, pointing out that his political party had
requested for 210 nomination forms but was only given 40 on 21 June 2013. He
therefore requested that the sitting of the nomination court be postponed by 2 weeks to
enable fuller preparations to be made. This application, which had been filed as an exparte application, was dismissed on 28 June 2013. No reasons have been provided to
date by the court.
Gotora v ZEC & Anor14
Gotora is the president of the Zimbabwe Organised Open Political Party. He filed his
nomination papers for the presidential election at 15:00hrs on 28 June 2013. At
15:13hrs, he was asked to furnish his party lists by the nomination court. He went to
obtain these and submitted them before 16:00hrs. At around 9pm, he was called and
advised that his nomination forms were rejected on account of not having included
nominees from nine provinces. This matter was not set down in the Constitutional Court
and Gotora was advised through a memorandum that his papers did not highlight any
constitutional issue and his proper recourse would have had been to approach the
Electoral Court.
4.3.1.4 Political party funding
Zimbabwe Development Party v Minister of Justice & 3 Ors15
In this application the Zimbabwe Development Party sought an order from the
Constitutional Court compelling the Minister of Justice to release funds to it for the
purposes of advancing multi-party democracy. It was argued that the 5% quota
required before political parties accessed public funds for political purposes was an
infringement of the constitutional guarantee to promote multi-party democracy in that
it only favored those who were in Parliament and excluded the smaller parties. An
urgent Application for this matter to be heard on an urgent basis was granted in case
number CCZ33/13 and the matter was heard on 26 June 2013. The application was
dismissed by the Constitutional Court. No reasons have been provided to date by the
court.
13 Constitutional Court of Zimbabwe unreported case number 39/13.
14 Constitutional Court Zimbabwe unreported case 59/13.
15 Constitutional Court of Zimbabwe unreported case 25/13 and 33/13.
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