sing letters from a housing co-operative, Enerst Kadungure Housing Co-op, as proofs of residence.
What this means is that we have a situation where people are being registered in a constituency where they do not belong simply because they have been allocated stands in the particular constituency. We observed that there were no people who reside at the stands as no developments or construction is taking place at the stands yet people are allegedly staying at these stands.
To make matters worse, those who have been offered the stands and the ‘proof of residence’ by this housing co-operative are ordered to provide five witnesses who are subsequently also given ‘proof of residence’ against the same stand number. They are also advised to register as voters in the constituency. One wonders how many hundreds of people have been registered against these stands. What is however clear is that for every stand, a minimum of six people get registered in a constituency they do not reside.
Teachers who are resident in as far places as Gokwe have ‘benefited’ from this co-operative and are now registered to vote in the constituency even before they have dug-out foundations for their houses at the places they are now purported to be residing at.
ZESN has also noted that there haven’t been any mobile registration team for Masvingo urban. All the centres covered by the mobile teams are outside the city with the closest being Chikarudzo Business centre which is more than 20 kilometres out of the city. ZESN has been inundated by calls from residents of Masvingo who felt disadvantaged by the absence of the mobile registration facility. They allege that efforts to get assistance from the Registrar General’s office in the city have been futile as the officers at the RG’s office allegedly told them that the registration exercise currently taking place “is for rural areas.”
Post published in: News