The Sunday News
Sunday News Reporter
THE majority of Zimbabweans say there is no need for further electoral reforms, according to a survey conducted by Leaders for Africa Network released in Harare on Tuesday.
According to the survey, conducted in June and early this month in the country’s ten provinces where 2500 people were interviewed, 76 percent of the people said there was no need for further electoral reforms ahead of the 30 July elections, while 20 percent felt there was a need for reforms and the remainder was indifferent.
The responses were based on a criteria of the autonomy of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, free and fair media, security forces’ neutrality, the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) process and the issue of the ballot.
The organisation that carried out the survey, Leaders for Africa Network (LAN) is an independent governance focused think-tank established on the values of pan-Africanism to spearhead academic advocacy for socio-economic policy-making processes. The organisation, which is a Zimbabwean think tank, says it strives to be a progressive conduit for plural citizen engagement on local and central governance issues through research, publishing and public dialogue forums.
The majority of respondents (70 percent) also felt Zec was non-partisan with 15 percent adding that the commission was not being influenced in its decisions. Eight percent felt Zec was being influenced in its decisions and seven percent felt it was partisan.
“The measure of Zec’s independence for the purpose of this study centred on its capacity to make decisions which are not influenced by any political party and how it has an all-inclusive approach to dealing with the interests of all political parties,” said the report.
The majority of those interviewed added that the army was not in any way influencing the election processes. The respondents also demonstrated that the run-up to the 2018 election was peaceful with 80 percent saying they have never witnessed any inter-party violence.
“This could be an indication of a growing culture of political tolerance in the country. On the other hand, the feedback affirms the view that there is limited to no cohesion being used to influence the voting process in favour of any political party,” the report said.
There was also massive support for the BVR system with 71.20 percent saying it created transparency.
“The 2018 Election Credibility Survey is a research-based summative account of the electorate’s perceptions on Zimbabwe’s 2018 election climate. The report maps the credibility index of the coming harmonised elections from a citizen point of view. The survey evaluates the public’s attitudes towards Zec against a background of its alleged bias towards the ruling party. Therefore, the survey interrogates the integrity and independence of ZEC in executing its mandate ahead of the coming 2018 election. The findings of this study are also illustrative of the public’s appreciation of the ruling ZANU-PF’s policy pledge to create a free, fair and credible election environment. In the same vein, the study probes the extent to which key electoral reforms have been implemented so far,” said the report.
