However, for the country to hold a dispute-free poll, it has to play within the rules set by the regional Southern African Development Community bloc in 2004, or at least fulfill the demands of the Global Political Agreement signed in 2008.
Mugabe’s calls for an early poll, juxtaposed with the situation on the ground, have continued to upset his political opponents, political analysts and the Institute for Democracy in Africa, who all indicated recently that the country was wide off the mark in terms of the guidelines.
Without reforms
Idasa’s most recent concerns, raised in its latest report, “Measuring the Zimbabwean electoral environment according to the SADC guidelines governing democratic elections,” was recently supported by MDC-T national chairman, Lovemore Moyo, and Harare-based political analyst, Blessing Ivan Vava.
Zimbabwe, as a signatory to the benchmark principles, has to satisfy them, hence the criticism of Mugabe’s hardline stance of preparing for elections “with or without” critical reforms.
In its report, the South African-headquartered institution said Zimbabwe fell short of fulfilling issues like full participation of citizens in the political process, freedom of association, political tolerance, equal opportunity for all political parties to access state media, equal opportunity to exercise the right to vote and be voted for and the independence of the judiciary and impartiality of the electoral institutions.
Voter education, challenge of the election results as provided for in the law of the land, voter registration, freedom of choice, use of public resources and political party financing, freedom from intimidation, fear and violence and media freedom and access to information also lagged behind.
Grip on power
“President Mugabe has put nine pieces of legislation under his office without consulting his unity government partners as per some provisions of the Global Political Agreement, a move some critics view as an attempt to consolidate his grip on power ahead of next year’s general elections,” said Idasa.
“In a statutory instrument recently gazetted, the president single-handedly allocated himself the Commission of Inquiry Act, Emergency Powers Act, Honours and Awards Act, Interception of Communication Act, Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act, Procurement Act, Radiation Protection Act, Research Act and the Zimbabwe National Security Council Act.”
Attacks on political opponents by Zanu (PF) supporters, some of them at the instigation of sitting Members of Parliament and officials, had also put a dampener on the country’s quest to achieve political tolerance ahead of the polls.
An October threat by information minister Webster Shamu to take full control of state-run media also came as a clear act of Zanu (PF)’s ambitions to propagate the party’s message to the largest audience possible.
Partisan commission
The Electoral Amendment Bill still gave the Electoral Commission the discretion to decide on the inclusion of other players in the provision of voter education, something that might see the partisan electoral commission exclude other stakeholders in providing voter education and limit the number of voter education organisations.
“Where there is a tie in the run-off election, the EAB requires that the election of the President can be decided by an electoral college of MPs in Parliament. This provision usurps people’s power to determine who is to occupy the highest office in the country and gives this power to a few MPs,” added Idasa.
Moyo, recently in Johannesburg, told The Zimbabwean that his party would continue to fight for a level playing field that would allow citizens to choose their next leaders without fear.
“We are steadfast in that the electoral roadmap we wrote must be followed and that all set benchmarks must be implemented before we can talk about the next elections,” said the Speaker of Parliament.
A lot to be done
“We still want to see an end to violence, security sector reform, media freedom and a referendum that will pave way for a new democratic constitution to be put in place. We are not scared of elections, but we want the next polls to be free of contestations that followed the last. Without these benchmarks, there will be no elections.”
Vava concurred that a lot still needed to be done administratively to get the country ready.
“It not surprising that Zimbabwe is not ready because the leaders in government are not serious in addressing the political situation in the country,” said Vava.
“They are preoccupied in resources accumulation and luxuries. Look at how they have handled the constitution-making process and that alone shows you the lack of seriousness in as far as taking this country forward is concerned. The country is not ready for elections because there hasn’t been much reform to talk about so far.”
Post published in: Opinions & Analysis