12. GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS IN THE AFTERMATH OF THE BVR PROCES In light of observations highlighted above and in line with best practice in electoral processes, the Zimbabwe Election Support network recommends the following for the remaining 2018 electoral processes and future voter registration exercises: ZEC 1. ZEC needs to institute proper voter and civic education ahead of critical electoral processes including but not limited to voter registration. Such voter and civic education must be extensive, inclusive, and comprehensive, which entails that ZEC: a. Coordinates with the Registrar General to facilitate the issuing of National Identification documents especially in farming areas where a lot of people were unable to register due to lack of IDs. b. Ensures that the voter processes and education information is also accessible to people living with disabilities especially those with visual and hearing impairments. c. Intensifies targeted voter education and mobilisation efforts towards the youths and other segments of the population whose turnout statistics have traditionally been low. 2. ZEC must enhance the quality of training for its officers to ensure consistency in the application of laws and regulations regarding stakeholder participation, access to information, and polling, registration, as well as inspection centres. 3. ZEC must ensure adequate sharing of voter information, and comprehensively publicise any processes that include and or entail citizen participation. Such sharing of information must not just be general and placed in nationally distributed press outlets, but also, tailored to local interests and targets through locally available channels like community newspapers. 4. ZEC should ensure that voter registration, inspection and polling centres are easily accessible to all eligible citizens and ensure that PWDs and other special needs groups are not inconvenienced when they present themselves for the registration process. 5. ZEC must ensure that updates it provides including figures, like voter registration statistics, are in a format that is disaggregated by various filters such as province, constituencies, age and sex among others. 6. ZEC should facilitate the creation of standing multiparty liaison committees to discuss and stem issues related to political parties, actors and supporters adherence to the stipulated code of conduct during the electoral processes. 7. ZEC must proactively address instances of deliberate misinformation by some political parties regarding electoral processes to ensure the integrity of the electoral process and minimise voter intimidation and misinformation that may result in apathy. 8. ZEC should publicise the simplified version of its procedures and regulations governing data transmission during all the critical electoral processes including registration, inspection of the voters roll, voting, and voting returns to increase stakeholders understanding of these critical processes. a. These procedures must be standardised and implemented uniformly to ensure consistency. 58