by Bayano Valy – SANF 08 No 23
Zimbabweans are continuing to demonstrate political maturity as they await the full release of the 29 March harmonised elections, much as they did on polling day.
On election day Zimbabweans flocked to the polling stations to vote for presidential, senate, house of assembly and council candidates in a generally calm and orderly manner.
Harmonisation of the elections is in line with the SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections that recommend the holding of elections in one single day.
There were four presidential candidates, three of them trying to unseat incumbent President Robert Mugabe: they are Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC Tsvangirai); Simba Makoni, former finance minister, and political debutante Langton Towungana, both independents.
There were 779 candidates for the 210 seats in the House of Assembly in the harmonised election, and 197 aspirants for the 60 elected seats in the upper house, the Senate, from 12 political parties and 116 independents, according to the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), the body charged with running the elections.
By Monday afternoon ZEC had released the House of Assembly results for 38 constituencies divided equally between the ruling Zanu PF and the MDC opposition, with each gaining in their strongholds of rural and urban areas, respectively.
Analysts say this method of slow public release of results, that are already posted at polling stations and constituency centres, allows the voters to get a picture of what is happening nationwide and to prepare the parties to accept the poll outcome in an orderly manner, reflecting the manner in which the people voted.
MDC Tsvangirai opposition had started claiming victory even before the first results were out but they were encouraged to await the official results from ZEC.
Election observers commended ZEC’s approach, saying this gives a balanced and objective picture, and encourages acceptance and tolerance.
This has certainly happened because people have been waiting calmly and peacefully.
For the voting day ZEC had deployed 107,690 polling officers who oversaw voting in 11,000 polling stations throughout the country.
Zimbabwe’s electorate is estimated at just over 5.9 million registered voters out of a population of around 12 million.
The following is the breakdown of registered voters in the country’s 10 provinces: Bulawayo (320,772), Harare (784,598), Manicaland (774,482), Mashonaland Central (522,107), Mashonaland East (658,123), Mashonaland West (625,729), Masvingo (740,969), Matabeleland North (366,271), Matabeleland South (355,480) and Midlands (786,237).
