The Sunday News
CANDIDATES for the 10 June by-elections in the 16 constituencies across the country have been on the campaign trail in recent weeks and the countdown continues this week as the mobilisation of voters enters the home stretch.
The campaigns have been quite peaceful so far in most parts of the country and we would like to urge that the situation remain so. Peace during electoral contests is a sure sign of growth of maturity of both the contestants and their supporters.
Police have been reported as having warned would-be perpetrators of violence during the forthcoming by-elections to behave or face the wrath of the law. We applaud the stance by the police and urge them to deploy officers to prevent the occurrence of any violence during the elections.
However, it should be noted that the onus is on the voters to keep the peace and make their point through the ballot box in support of their favoured candidate.
In Bulawayo province where police issued the warning, there will be National Assembly elections in five constituencies that fell vacant after the MDC-T recalled its legislators who defected to the splinter group, MDC Renewal.
The constituencies are Pelandaba-Mpopoma, Pumula, Lobengula, Luveve and Makokoba. As pointed out by the police, supporters of the different candidates have been peaceful in their campaigns and we urge them to continue on that path so that democracy becomes the ultimate winner.
We also take this opportunity to urge those parties that chose to boycott the elections to stick to their decision of non-participation since we believe they are exercising their democratic right not to participate.
What shall not be acceptable, however, would be for these parties’ supporters to try and force other people not to exercise their right to vote peacefully for a candidate of their choice.
This is the area that we encourage the police force to watch closely, not only in Bulawayo but in Tsholotsho North as well and all the other areas too, where by-elections take place on 10 June. We are heartened by the pro-active stance by the police force and call upon the political parties and individual candidates taking part in the elections to spread the message of peace among their supporters.
“The police will not condone any form of lawlessness before, during and after the by-elections. Contesting political parties and general members of the public are therefore strongly warned against any form of violence or conduct that’s in breach of the law,” said Bulawayo Metropolitan province acting police spokesman, Assistant Inspector Abednico Ncube.
We learn that at least 400 000 people have registered to vote in the 10 June National Assembly by-elections, and we believe these people should be given the chance to express their wishes through the ballot box.
With the latest Zimbabwe Electoral Commission statistics showing that the average number of registered voters is 25 000 per constituency, we believe these citizens deserve to be granted an environment that is conducive for free and fair elections.
Zimbabwe has run elections successfully a countless times since independence in 1980 and the forthcoming elections cannot be an exception — peace begins with all of us.
