public the opportunity to hear and view the whole proceedings as they happened. The
Commission noted that Zimbabweans remained commendably calm ahead of the
hearing and when the Constitutional Court ruled in favour of the ZANU PF Presidential
candidate, Emmerson Mnangagwa.
5.4 Post - Election Complaints Received and Investigated
After the announcement of the results, ZHRC received twenty eight (28) complaints of
intimidation of citizens perceived to have voted for the opposition and those who acted
as polling agents for opposition23 parliamentary or council candidates in both urban
and rural communities. From the investigations undertaken to date, the ZHRC
established that some of the cases on intimidation of or violence on opposition polling
agents could not be sustained. For example, a case received on the burning of an
opposing candidate polling agent’s property (home) in Muzarabani could not be
sustained.
The twenty eight (28) cases received by the Commission emanated from five (5) out
of the ten (10) Provinces namely, Manicaland Province, Mashonaland East Province,
Mashonaland Central Province, Mashonaland West Province and Midlands Province.
Seventeen (17) out of the twenty eight (28) cases were related to intimidation. Ten
(10) of the total number of cases concerned partisan distribution of food aid and
Presidential inputs, where known opposition political party members were unfairly
discriminated against owing to the fact that they did not vote for the ruling party.
The table below illustrates the number of cases received by the Commission during
the post-election period and the human rights issues involved:
23
Those who are not members of the ruling party ZANU PF.
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