Voters roll shambles- thousands of names missing (28-06-07)

oll while opposition parties are accusing the government of leaving out the names of thousands of young voters.
The details emerged as opposition and civic groups called on government to extend the voter registration period, which opened on June 18 and is expected to end on August 17.
The country’s largest opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), threatened to take the matter to court unless Registrar of Voters Tobaiwa Mudede undertook in writing to prepare a supplementary roll of people omitted and to issue ID cards to everyone who is 18 or over.
“They have deliberately left off thousands of young people, precisely the sort of people who are the MDC’s most ardent supporters,” said party spokesman Nelson Chamisa.
Mudede immediately refuted the allegations saying if it was intended that a certain section of the community should be disenfranchised, then why put the voters’ roll to public inspection? Mudede said anyone whose name was not appearing on the roll should register at the mobile voter registration teams doing the rounds around the country.
Voters go to the polls in March to elect a new expanded 200-seat Lower House, and to vote for 50 contestable senate seats; and a President.
The MDC said it would set up a voters’ roll “hotline” for people that had been left off the voters’ roll and were running into problems with new registration.
The independent Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) said voter registration should not be a cosmetic exercise but should be a meaningful and all-inclusive electoral process in order that it may amply serve its purpose in the conduct of fair elections.
“The network, however, still believes that voter registration should be one of the duties of a truly independent electoral commission for whose establishment ZESN is still calling,” the statement said.
“It is ZESN’s considered opinion that the current situation where a department of the Ministry of Home Affairs conducts voter registration, albeit under the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), is undesirable and a potential source of electoral disputes. ZESN, therefore, believes that an adequately resourced independent electoral commission should carry out this strategic task.”