Speaking to The Zimbabwean soon after touring Seke Teachers College and being briefed by the polling officer for the centre, Ephraim Mutubuki, on why there was no voting taking place, the SADC observer, Henry Mussa said his team was happy with the country’s electoral environment and the whole electoral process.
Chitungwiza has only one polling station for the special vote but it could not be established how many voters were registered in this constituency to cast their vote during the two day period set aside for mostly security personnel, diplomatic missions, civil servants and Zimbabwe Electoral Commission officials, who will not be able to cast their vote during the harmonised election slated for July 31.
Mussa said: “This is our first port of call in this special vote. We are simply trying to appreciate the process.
“What we have noticed is that so far, so good. The election is incident free and we are generally satisfied with how the process is being conducted,” he said.
Mussa acknowledged that because the conduct of elections was not a one day event, the process was bound to experience a few logistical challenges.
“In any process, there are hitches but we believe that these are not deliberate,” said Mussa.
No polling took place in Chitungwiza between noon and 3:30pm on Sunday because of the late arrival of ballots.
The majority of prospective voters had left the polling station, with a few coming back now and again to check whether their ballots had arrived.
Post published in: News