Majority of Zimbabwean people across the country’s eight provinces still have a negative perception of police and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission, doubting their capacity to professionally manage next week’s Zimbabwe general elections.

Zimbabwe Council of Churches (ZCC) pre-election survey released on Saturday noted that only Harare and Manicaland residents had some modicum of trust in both Zimbabwe police and ZEC.

The survey also suggested the majority of the population preferred the private media for the supply of balanced pre-election reports.

The survey, which targeted all Zimbabwe main provinces, reached out to 2 564 respondents, of which the majority (94%) were registered to vote in the upcoming harmonised elections scheduled for next Monday.

“Among the 10 provinces, Masvingo (48%) and Midlands (40%) rated Zec poorly in terms of their level of engagement in promoting peaceful, free and fair elections. Manicaland (30.8%) and Harare (27.8%) rated Zec extremely well in terms of the level of engagement in promoting peaceful, free and fair elections,” the ZCC pre-election survey report read.

“Among the key public institutions directly involved in electoral processes, namely Zec, ZRP, State media and the private media: the private media is rated highly (adequately – extremely well) in promoting peaceful, free and fair elections. The State media was rated lowly with 32% rating it to be poorly performing, followed by Zec (26%), ZRP (19%),” part of the report read.