The South African Development Cooperation (SADC) has played an important role in the electoral reforms in Zimbabwe. The development of regional standards has been important for the neighbouring countries’ assessment of elections in Zimbabwe and a quite efficient tool in improving the elections, not least by introducing an election commission. In Appendix A there is a brief summary of election related SADC and African Union (AU) standards. This report covers only the national and provincial elections in detail. However, many of the comments are valid also for the local elections. 2 The Objectives of the Report The main purpose of this report is to present a thorough factual description of the elections and to draw lines from previous elections with an emphasis on technical aspects. The elections were highly controversial and the MDC formations who lost the elections contested their validity. The regional observer missions reported on irregularities but they did not dispute the validity of the results and neither did the neighbouring countries. Western governments were far more critical and doubted that the outcome was a genuine expression of the will of the people. The most credible domestic observer organisation ZESN also concluded that the process was seriously flawed. This report will not draw firm conclusions as to which extent the undisputable irregularities did cause ZANU PF to win ahead of MDC-T or whether the irregularities were so serious that they discredited the election process irrespective of the outcome. It is clear that serious violations of international standards occurred, but the report will concentrate on facts and figures which may help others in drawing more holistic conclusions. It will also refer the observer reports’ main conclusions. 3 Summary and Overall Assessment The new constitution was passed in a referendum in March 2013. Both the ruling party ZANU PF and the two MDC formations, which were part of the coalition government from 2009 to the elections, recommended the draft which had been negotiated for four years. The parties agreed to hold elections shortly after the Constitution had been promulgated, but disagreed on the date. ZANU PF seemed to be more in a hurry to have elections fast, whereas the MDC formations wanted a few months for preparations. President Mugabe announced an early date, which was confirmed by the Constitutional Court. After that, all parties took part in the process. MDC-T was optimistic that they would win the elections as they had done in the first round in 2008 and implicitly accepted a number of deficiencies still in place on election day. However, they did not win. The official results showed that ZANU PF had won with a large margin. After the election, there were a number of allegations about rigging before and during the 31 July elections. The claims included, but were not limited to: 1. The capacity to register new voters in the big cities during the 10 June – 9 July registration drive was limited; 2. The final voter register was not given to parties and civil society for scrutiny before the elections; 3. Those who did not get a chance to vote during the special voting were given a possibility to vote on election day with high risks of double voting; 4. A large number of voters were turned away on election day because they were not found on the lists of the polling station they turned up at, even if they had been duly registered; The report gives a detailed account of some of the legal processes preceding and following the elections. In particular the Constitutional Court decision on the date of the elections is extensively covered since the actual content of the deliberations has not been broadly discussed by commentators – only its conclusions. In addition the post-election complaints are being discussed. 5. People were allowed to vote on the basis of voter registration slips if they were not found on the voter registers, which created a risk of double or illegitimate voting by such voters; The report also provides an analysis based upon results broken down to the constituency level, and the results have been compared to similar results in previous elections. The purpose is partly to provide a baseline for further analysis even of future elections and partly to provide indicators which may be used when investigating possible irregularities. 7. There was a large number of assisted voters, which created a potential of intimidation of such voters by the police and election staff; Finally, the mathematics of the proportional distribution formula is discussed. This is done in order to make improvements for the future but also to document some of the side effects of the method of largest remainder, a discussion which may become useful also in other countries. 6 6. There was an unnatural movement of voters to certain constituencies; 8. There were reports of intimidation by people of authority, such as traditional leaders, before and during the vote; 9. The conditions for the parties in public TV and radio were uneven. 7