On 31 May the newly formed Constitutional Court handed down a judgement in a case brought forward by a private person, Jealously Mawarire, who claimed that his constitutional right to have elections before the 30 June had been violated by the failure of the President to proclaim elections by that date. The Court agreed with the claimant but since it was already too late for 30 June, it set 31 July 2013 as the latest date for the elections. day by the Statutory Instrument No 86 of 2013. The MDC factions protested against the decision, which had been made unilaterally without consultations with the Prime Minister. An extraordinary SADC Summit in Maputo on 15 June “agreed on the need for the Government of Zimbabwe to engage the Constitutional Court to seek more time beyond the 31 July 2013 deadline for holding the Harmonized Elections”. The most obvious reading of Article 58 (1) of the old Constitution would be that elections would have to be held within four months of the dissolution of parliament, which was 29 June. That would mean that elections could be held any time before 29 October 2013. The Constitutional Court, however, set forward two possible ways of reading the paragraph, named by the Court as Reading A and Reading B: Then, without consulting or notifying his inclusive government colleagues from MDC-T and MDC, the Minister of Justice Chinamasa on 18 June filed a rather half-hearted application with the Constitutional Court seeking the postponement of polling until 15 August. The Prime Minister and other stakeholders, believing that this proposed extension still left too little time to prepare properly for elections, filed opposing papers and also made separate applications asking the court to postpone the date further. The Constitutional Court on 4 July 2013 not only dismissed all the applications, but also confirmed 31st July as the election date. 11 “READING ‘A’ Part 6 Elections and Sessions 58 Elections (1) A general election and elections for members of the governing bodies of local authorities shall be held on i. such day or days within a period not exceeding four months after the issue of a proclamation dissolving Parliament under Section 63(7) or, ii. as the case may be, the dissolution of Parliament under Section 63(4) as the President may, by proclamation in the Gazette, fix.” “READING ‘B’ Part 6 Elections and Sessions 58 Elections (1) A general election and elections for members of the governing bodies of local authorities shall be held on such day or days within a period not exceeding four months after: i. the issue of a proclamation dissolving Parliament under Section 63(7) or, ii. as the case may be, the dissolution of Parliament under Section 63(4) as the President may, by proclamation in the Gazette, fix.” The Court argued that common sense would mean that there is no real reason for giving the president four months to call for elections in the case when the date of the dissolution is known long time in advance. Therefore Reading A was to their mind the most obvious. This reading depends on introducing colons and numberings where such signs do not exist and it diverged considerably from a straight forward reading of the actual paragraph, to put it mildly. Following the court decision the President on 13 June declared 31 July 2013 as election 22 After this all parties and the ZEC, continued preparing for the 31 July 2013 election. 8 The Pre-election Phases 8.1 Voter registration The voter registration process and the voter register itself were subject to heavy criticism. In its transitional articles the new Constitution left the responsibility for the voter register to the Registrar General for this first election before transferring it to the ZEC. The ZEC should supervise the process but in practice the work was carried out by the Registrar General. The Constitution stated that there should be a one month special registration drive ahead of the election. This was carried out from 10 June to 9 July 2013. The process was criticised for the slow performance in the cities and for a lack of transparency. The law stated in Section 21 that the parties and other stakeholders could have an electronic copy of the register for inspection: “(3) T  he Commission shall within a reasonable period of time provide any person who requests it, and who pays the prescribed fee, with a copy of any ward or constituency voters roll, either in printed or in electronic form as the person may request. (4) Within a reasonable period of time after the calling of an election, the Commission shall provide, on payment of the prescribed fee, to every political party that intends to contest the election, and to any observer who requests it, one copy of every voters roll to be used in the election, either in printed or in electronic form as the party or observer may request. 11 Court Watch 12/2013. 23