Staff ReporterZimbabwe’s main opposition, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, has reportedly threatened to stage a country wide demonstration on June 5 in a bid to force President Emmerson Mnangagwa to agree to electoral reform demands.
According to New Zimbabwe.com, MDC spokesperson Thabita khumalo said the party had been forced into a corner by Mnangagwa’s “intransigence and goal shifting” over electoral reforms for the July 30 vote.
Khumalo said that her party was not happy with the reforms that were signed into law by Mnangagwa in recent weeks.
She said that they were a number of issues that the MDC was not happy about, but the major concern was the refusal by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to give the party access to the voters roll and the name of the company that will print ballot papers.
“We cannot have the same shifting ballot papers like we had in 2013. We want to know who is printing, in whose custody the ballots will be and how many have been printed. It’s important for the credibility of the elections,” Khumalo was quoted as saying.
She said that the new biometric voters’ roll had “suspicious centenarians on it”.
According to the state-owned Herald newspaper, ZEC chairperson Justice Priscilla Chigumba said that the final voters roll would be made available before the sitting of the nominations courts.
Chigumba said that prospective candidate were now free to collect and fill out nomination forms before the nomination court day.
“The voters’ roll will be available a few days before the sitting of the nomination courts. It will be available to successful candidates at the nomination court free of charge. Thereafter such copies in the hard and soft copy format will be available to members of the public for a fee,” Chigumba was quoted as saying.
