2. Mashonaland Central and Mashonaland East, both ZANU PF strongholds, had the lowest turn‐away figure, at 4.9% of voters. This was 56% of the average turn away rate, or slightly more than half the rate experienced in other constituencies. Harare is an MDC‐T stronghold. There were a large number of complaints in Harare about voters being turned away from polling stations that they had voted at in the past, for being in the wrong ward or constituency, or no longer on the roll.95 It must be noted that in Mashonaland West, a ZANU PF stronghold, there were also unusually high numbers of voters turned away – 15%, the same rate as in Harare. As we do not have the constituency or ward figures for turn‐aways, it is not clear if this predominated in parts of the province that had swung to MDC‐T in 2008, for example. Bulawayo, another major MDC‐T stronghold, had slightly above average numbers of people turned away, but in certain Bulawayo constituencies the turn away rate was higher than the overall city average of 8.7%. Bulawayo East is such a constituency, where the turn‐ away rate was 11%. 96 Turning away 8.7% of voters in any election seems a very high turn away rate, and this was certainly partly the result of the failure of ZEC to produce the voters’ roll in good time, which would have allowed voters to clarify their wards and polling stations ahead of voting day, as well as to challenge their absence from the roll where appropriate. 5. ASSISTED VOTES ZEC reports that there were 206,901 assisted voters countrywide. On the face of it, this figure is not statistically high, given that there is an assumption of 86% literacy in Zimbabwe.97 ZEC’s figure is only 5.9% of voters – i.e. considerably fewer than the 14% of voters who might be assumed to be illiterate.98 The ward‐by‐ward breakdown for assisted votes is not available, nor are figures by constituency. It is the prerogative of any voter to request assistance or not, and in terms of the revised Electoral Act, s/he also has the right to bring her/his own assistant along. If such a voter does not have his/her own assistant, then the presiding officer together with three others will provide the assistance. Assisted voters are recorded on specific forms, and it is the responsibility of observers and polling agents to also record them. It is acknowledged that individuals who cannot read and write can nonetheless often recognize the symbol of their political party on a ballot paper and place an X beside it, and that the illiteracy rate is NOT equivalent to the number of people needing assistance in an                                                              95Daily News, “Massive vote fraud unearthed”, Harare, 1August 2013. ZESN election report 2013, page 88. 96 Information from David Coltart’s website and in his interview with SWRadioAfrica on 23 August 2013. 97 UNESCO placed Zimbabwe’s literacy rate among over 15 year olds at 85.97% in their 1999 statistics, their most recent figure. If anything, following more than a decade of disastrous education policies, literacy rates will have fallen in all provinces. 98 See Appendix 4 for percentage rates linked to Figure 4.   39