Human Rights Archive Zimbabwe

The data collected reported six hundred and eighty eight human rights violations, which have been incorporated into the Shutdown Atrocities Report of the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum (of which ZPP is member).

This dispatch reports results from a survey of public opinion on the status of the electoral race conducted one month before the day of voting with a representative sample of 2,400 voting-age adults drawn from all 10 provinces of Zimbabwe. The survey was commissioned by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Afro-barometer's core partner in Southern Africa, and implemented by the Mass Public Opinion Institute, Afro-barometer's national partner in Zimbabwe.

This report focuses on how Zimbabwe has an unenviable reputation for being the most politically violent country in Southern Africa, certainly since the civil wars ended in Angola and Mozambique, and the independence of Namibia and South Africa.

The mission observed that the degree of human rights violations in the country follows a recurring pattern that usually culminates during electoral periods. The country was facing a political deadlock where the leading parties, especially ZANU-PF, were unlikely to reach any agreement likely to improve the political environment, since the MDC considered the implementation of the reforms foreseen by the GPA as a pre-condition for the organisation of elections, while ZANU-PF called for elections as a means to put an end to the prevailing deadlock.

This is the first in the series of Special Reports issued by the Research Unit of the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum. It displaced the original proposal to deal with gender and constitutional issues. This change was necessitated by the wave of lawlessness which resulted in massive human rights abuses during most of 2000.

Amnesty International researchers have been monitoring the human rights environment in Zimbabwe as the country approaches the 31 March parliamentary elections. Although there are fewer reports of politically-motivated violence than has been the case in previous elections, Amnesty International is concerned that human rights are being systematically violated in the context of election campaigning.

The report has information about election campaigns by various parties as well as the election results. It also consists of the incidents of the day after the elections.

Zimbabwe’s 2018 elections were the first to be observed by the Commonwealth in 16 years. The Commonwealth last observed Zimbabwe’s 2002 Presidential Election. As such, this observation mission provided a unique opportunity to accompany Zimbabwe on a critical leg of its democratic journey.

This report provides a thorough analysis primarily of the technical aspects of the elections, complementing the observer reports that have been published by other organisations.

This report outlines the purpose of elections, characteristics of Parliament, electoral system,transitory provisions, general political considerations and conduct of elections. It also showed the distribution of members of the house of assembly according to their professional category, distribution of seats in the senate, distribution of House of Assembly members according to sex and according to age group.

This report is based on the information received from the monitors deployed across the country and from complaints received.

The report highlights the findings of the ZHRC before, during and after the elections and the ZHRC’s own observations.

The Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission (ZHRC) monitored and assessed the 2018 harmonized elections held on the 30th of July 2018. The primary objective was to ensure that the elections were conducted freely and fairly in accordance with national legal frameworks, and regional and international instruments that advance the observance and respect for human rights and freedoms of all citizens.

Democratic free and fair elections are an integral component of international human rights law as recognised at the apex of the Human Rights system in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Universal Declaration).

Following several requests by the Zimbabwe Election Support Network ZESN and other stakeholders for Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to release data, on the numbers of voters registered disaggregated by province and gender, the ZEC published the Biometric Voter Registration BVR data on its website in March 2018.

The review is juxtaposing the content of the promulgated regulations against the draft regulations, in light of the submissions made to ZEC by ZESN. More specifically the review analyses the extent to which written recommendations made by ZESN have been incorporated into the promulgated regulations.

The findings in this report are primarily informed by the Long Term Observers (LTOs) that ZESN deployed to the National Assembly Constituencies throughout the country. ZESN deployed 210 LTOs to track political developments in all the National Assembly Constituencies in Zimbabwe. During the Inspection of the provisional voters’ roll, ZESN deployed LTOs who visited 693 Inspection Centres (ICs) across the country during the inspection and making 909 visits in total during the process.

This report presents ZESN’s observations of each sector of the electoral cycle: the pre-election, the polling, and the post-election periods.

This report is based on observations made by the LTOs between 18 May and 07 July 2018 in their respective constituencies from across the country’s 10 provinces. However ZESN produced several thematic reports during the same reporting period, including a report inspection of the voters’ roll, the nomination court, and primary elections for political parties.

The seats fell vacant following the death on 9 June, 2015 of the ZANU-PF incumbent for Epworth constituency, Ambassador Amos Midzi; and the expulsion from ZANU-PF and subsequent recalling from Parliament of Ray Kaukonde and David Butau, former Members of Parliament for Marondera Central and Mbire respectively.

The overarching objective of the report is to provide ZESN and interested stakeholders with ward based comprehensive scientific data on population dynamics for 2018.

ZESN reiterates that the ability to exercise the democratic right to vote is premised on the respect for principles of democratic electoral processes upholding the key tenets of democracy such as inclusivity, comprehensiveness, transparency and accountability.

CSOS call for Comprehensive reforms to ensure Democratic Elections.