Zimbabwe – Ready for Elections? 17 Another71to prevent the organisation from launching an audit it had prepared on the voters’ roll.72 This order was granted without giving RAU an opportunity to be heard. One has to question the tenacity with which the R-G in refusing to make the process and contents of the roll transparent and publicly available. This does nothing to increase public confidence in the state of the voters’ roll and legitimises the concerns of those who argue that the roll will be used to manipulate the vote and its outcome on 31 July 2013. It remains unclear when the consolidated and updated voters’ roll produced after the end of the special and intensive mobile registration and inspection exercise will be made available to political parties, observers and other citizens. Four days before elections, and despite repeated requests, political parties had not yet been provided with copies of the updated voters’ roll to be used in the elections. ZLHR had also made a request for the roll before the mobile voter registration exercise commenced; to date, the request has not been acknowledged and the voters’ roll has not been provided to the organisation for scrutiny in violation of the Constitution. 2.8 Gendered aspects of voter registration and other challenges Women have traditionally been excluded from participating in certain activities because of their gendered roles. The voter registration exercise was one example of the failure of the electoral authorities to take into account the special needs of women, as the Electoral Act and relevant regulations on this aspect have not been engendered. There has been no effort to ensure that the law facilitates the participation of every citizen equally. The mobile voter registration exercise that started before the Constitution was adopted and continued afterwards for a further 30 days, was said to have been more mobile that the people themselves. There were many hurdles for first time voters (especially young women) and for women in general. The times during which registration and inspection took place did not take into account the special situation of women and their roles in the household and in their communities. The requirement for proof of residence also proved to be too onerous. Many young people and women do not own properties or have utility bills in their names that can be used as proof of residence. Initial policy directives from the Minister of Home Affairs were not responsive to the peculiar position of women, who were required to have their residence certified by their husband ortheir child. On 30 June, the proof of residence requirement was finally relaxed to allow individuals to complete an affidavit at the registration centre.73 The authorities proved to be overwhelmed by registration of voters who were in polygamous unions as some men were said to have come with 15 wives and 40 children 71 Unreported High Court Harare case 5790/13. 72 See V Langa “Shocking voters roll irregularities unearthed” Newsday (8 July 2013) p 1. 73 See ZEC statement on mobile voter registration The Standard (30 June 2013) p 5.