roll in ‘the last 12 months’ to confirm that their registration details remain in order. Three‐
quarters of those who report their status as currently not registered said they still intend to get
registered.
Party share of responsibility for good‐very good performance in Inclusive Government
The comparison of 2010 and 2012 findings on which party gets the most credit for successes of
the IG the MDC‐T suffers a sharp decline. In 2010 it was 52% of Zimbabweans that reckoned that
the MDC‐T was the main contributor to IG successes – by 2012 this recognition had fallen to
15%. ZANU‐PF picked up a portion of the shifting credit. There was also a greater tendency in
2012 than in 2010 to credit the two parties equally.
Changing experiences of national and local economic conditions
Life for Zimbabweans has become less survival‐oriented. Zimbabweans (49%, with other
assessments scattered over a range of response categories) reckon economic conditions have
improved in the past year, and they have good hopes (58% do) that things will be better or
much better in another year’s time. Another 28% consider things to be about the same as a year
earlier, meaning that just a small minority feel that things have worsened.
The most serious problem that Zimbabweans confront on the��national level is unemployment.
On the local level, this is roughly equalled by poor services. The survey showed that around two‐
thirds of Zimbabweans are formally unemployed, and the effects are felt strongly on both
community and national levels. Despite many improvements in their lives, Zimbabweans
consistently still rate food shortages as one of the most pervasive problems.
Consistent with the respondents’ indication of main problems that the country and they
themselves face, IG is rated substantially worse in 2012 than in late 2010 on issues such as
making consumer goods available and distributing food relief. The IG is doing equally poorly on
impressions of attracting foreign investment. It is possible that the deficits remain vast despite
good IG performance, or that the popular expectations for continuous improvement continue to
rise.
Zimbabweans’ load of deprivations that they suffer has been getting lighter – even if IG remains
cynically assessed. On availability of food the reported deprivation level declined from 85‐50‐
31% from 2009 to 2010 to 2012; shortage of clean water for home use declined from 49‐43‐
42%; non‐availability of modern medicines decreased from 80‐65‐37%; lack of access to
traditional medicines (only measured in 2010 and 2012) declined from 9‐6%; shortage of
cooking fuel declined from 55‐48‐44%; and lack of cash income went down from 94‐91‐79%.
Stagnating and declining assessments of the work of the IG
The IG is often still highly positively assessed – such as in the sectors of making consumer goods
available and distributing food relief – despite getting substantially less positive assessments
than in 2010. On some questions the total positive assessments are below 50%, yet the positive
assessments often remain higher than the negatives.
7