Several Bulawayo residents complained that they had spent their money and time running after mobile registration officers, trying to get their names registered, but to no avail due to the electricity blackouts.
Most of those affected are the youth, who still do not have national registration documents that are needed when one is registering as a voter.
Zimbabwe has not issued registration documents for the past year, after the Registrar General’s office ran out of funds to process the documents.
“I have been spent the whole day at different mobile registration centres for the past week, trying to get a national registration certificate so that I can register as a voter, but in all those occasions, I have had to return home empty-handed,” said Mehluli Ncube on Nkulumane, who was still trying his luck at Nkulumane Hall.
An official with the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), confirmed that most people were failing to register for the elections due to the load shedding by ZESA.
“We serve very few people, about 10 per day here. Even when they take photographs, at times they are told by the Registrar General’s staff that they should go and collect their documents at National Registration offices in town at later dates, and so they have failed to register,” said the official. No comment could be obtained from the official ZEC spokesman. – Bayethe Zitha
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