Turnout of people wanting to register at district and sub district centers remains high in
Harare and Bulawayo and with six days remaining before the completion of the BVR mop-up
exercise the queues of people coming to register at these centers are not getting shorter. It
is therefore imperative that ZEC considers opening more centres at the sub-district level
where voter registration is currently not taking place. The sub-district centers, especially
those in urban areas, continue to register over 100 people per day which indicates that a
large number of eligible voter are still yet to register in the catchment areas of those district
centers. In Harare these centers include Town House, Parliament, Kuwadzana 2 High School
and Highfield West’s Zimbabwe Hall.
At Kuwadzana 2 High School, in Harare, the center has consistently been registering more
than 100 people daily.The catchment area for this registration center is large as evidenced by
the fact that people from as far as Dzivarasekwa extension, Whitecliff, Grenary and Rainham
are making their way daily to be registered as voters. The situation is exacerbated by the
fact that the BVR kit at this center is operated by one registration official. Despite the best
efforts of the registration official, people are waiting for hours just to be served and others
are having to return to their homes without registering to vote.
While ZESN appreciates that there is a daily limit to the number of persons that a BVR kit can
serve, ZESN believes the Commission needs to quickly respond to request for additional kits
at registration centers where high numbers of people are turning up to register in the urban
areas. The 16 additional kits that were deployed to Harare still appear inadequate. In
addition ZEC needs to correct the practice that is now widespread where registration
officials are turning away people who come to register after 15.00hours.
Civil Society Organizations’ Mobilization Efforts
A number of Civil Society Organizations have held a roadshows as part of efforts to mobilize
people to register. In the past week road shows have been held in Mutoko (by ZESN), Mount
Darwin (by Zimrights) among others. In addition COTRAD and EFZ set up information Kiosks
in Masvingo and Gwanda respectively in order to enhance people’s understanding of the
BVR process.