All observers agreed that the campaign and the polling had been peaceful. There also seemed to be no allegations of false tabulation of results. The observers agree that the reported results did reflect the votes cast in the polling stations. The difference of opinion was in how serious the irregularities which clearly took place were. SADC and AU observers reported on the flaws but did not conclude that the elections as such could be questioned. They rather noted the irregularities as possibilities for improvements in future elections. The MDC formations dismissed the results totally and called for new elections. Western embassies and governments questioned the validity of the results. It is not fruitful to try to assess if the irregularities related to the voters’ registers and movement of voters would be enough to explain the substantial victory of ZANU PF. Intimidation and media bias can anyway not be measured accurately. However, for a nuanced assessment of the elections and to which degree they complied with international standards, a description of both the process improvements as well as the faults that occurred during these elections is required. SADC had since 2005 pushed for an independent election committee to be in charge of the elections. These were the first elections where the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), which had been established earlier the same year, was in charge of most of the electoral processes. The exception was the voter register which was still under the control of the Registrar General. Most of the technical faults of the elections had to do with who was allowed to vote, not what happened once voters were in the polling station - with the exception of possible irregularities in the assistance of voters. The Registrar General had earlier had the full responsibility for organising elections, and had previously shown willingness to use any means to obtain a result favouring ZANU PF. The ZEC had a fairly balanced composition, but its professional staff had not been renewed or reviewed as had been demanded by the MDC formations. One of the big failures in the 2008 elections was the slow, and possibly wrong, publication of results. This fault was corrected during these elections. After the elections, the ZEC had information which could have uncovered whether voters had voted more than once or been turned away for no reason. However, the courts did not order the information to be disclosed. The Electoral Act should clarify that the ZEC has an overall responsibility to conduct correct elections and that the ZEC at its own initiative should be able to investigate all evidence available, without depending on a law decision. The ZEC could further within the framework of the law, have done more to improve the transparency of the tabulation, even if there were no claims of irregularities in the actual results calculation. Regardless whether one believes that the ZEC did their best to follow correct procedures and that the intentional irregularities were solely the responsibility of the Registrar General, or whether one believes that also the ZEC did yield to political pressure, there can be no doubt that the ZEC did a much more credible job than any election organiser had done before in Zimbabwe. The media imbalance and the intimidation by traditional leaders and others remained a serious problem, as in earlier elections. Clearly, this is in violation of international requirements for elections and had an effect on the results. It is impossible to assess what the results would have been if the conditions for the parties had been more equal. 4 The State and Government Structure 4.1 The Division of Powers Zimbabwe is a unitary state but the new constitution foresees a devolution of powers to province and local levels. The discussion during the constitutional drafting process was more about the composition of the new bodies at province level than on the actual powers of the councils. The degree of devolution of powers from central to province level was still to be defined. The new constitution retained the presidential system of government, or rather returned to it after having had a hybrid government model in the transition period. The president is head of government, the ministers are responsible to the president, not the parliament,5 and there is no prime minister post. 4.2 The Parliament Structure The parliament consists of two houses: The National Assembly (the lower house) has 270 members for the first two terms, after which it will be reduced to 210 members, and the Senate 80 members (with no transitional arrangements). In the National Assembly the 210 members were elected by a first-past-the-post (FPTP) system in single-member constituencies (the current system) and the 60 extra members were all reserved for women. To fill these 60 seats, six women were elected from each of the ten provinces under a system of list proportional representation (List PR). The Senate consisted of: (a) six members elected from each of the ten provinces, by a system of proportional representation; (b) sixteen chiefs, two elected by each of the Provincial Assembly of Chiefs from the provinces, other than the metropolitan provinces; (c) the President and Deputy President of the National Council of Chiefs; and (d) two members elected in the manner prescribed in the Electoral Law to represent persons with disabilities. 5 A minister can, however, be dismissed by a two-third vote of non-confidence of each house of parliament. 8 9