The Government has set aside $76 billion for the 2023 harmonised elections to cover various activities, with $53 billion earmarked for the actual polling.
Presenting the 2023 National Budget yesterday, Finance and
Economic Development Minister Professor Mthuli Ncube said other remaining
activities related to the elections requiring funds are voter registration and
inspection.
“The country will hold harmonised elections in 2023, as
enshrined in the Constitution. The preparations have already commenced, which
include the delimitation exercise, voter registration and voter’s role
inspection. The 2023 National Budget is setting aside resources to cover voter
registration ($12 billion), voter inspection $11 billion and actual election
conduct $53 billion, among others,” said Prof Ncube.
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) chief elections
officer, Mr Utloile Silaigwana, could not immediately comment last night saying
he was still to get through the Budget statement.
Political parties also said they needed time to familiarise
with the Budget statement.
Presently, ZEC is finalising the delimitation of electoral
boundaries following the conclusion of the population and housing census
exercise held in April this year.
Population census results will provide ZEC important
information in the delimitation exercise.
From April to end of September, the Central Registry
Department ran a blitz under which it issued national identification cards,
birth and death certificates, among others, to ensure people that have reached
the age of 18, could register to vote.
As part of ensuring the smooth flow of elections, the
Government has since gazetted the Electoral Amendment Bill that seeks to relax
registration requirements for voters ahead of next year’s harmonised elections.
The Bill will amend several provisions of the main Act for
it to conform with the Constitution.
Registration is now easier since potential voters just need
to give their address without providing documentary back-up.
When voters were required to produce proof of residence to
register to vote, some tenants not paying the primary rates faced challenges in
getting the proof of residence from landlords who either did not want to be
bothered or simply did not want to admit they had a tenant.
The Bill confirms that a driver’s licence cannot be used as
identification; voters have to produce the national ID card or a valid
passport.
A driver’s licence is issued by the Central Vehicle
Registry while the other two documents are official documents from the
Registrar-General and the Civil Registry Offices.
The new law will also provide the timeframe within which
national assembly and local authority candidates can withdraw from contesting
in an election and also provide for the incorporation of the 30 percent women’s
quota and the youth quota.
It is envisaged that once the Bill is enacted into law, it
will assist in ensuring that only citizens are able to vote in an election,
that proper candidates are allowed to contest in an election, providing clarity
on when and how a candidate can withdraw their candidature in an election so as
to afford ZEC sufficient time to make changes to the design of the ballot and
advising the electorate of any changes to the candidature in an election.
In his State of the National Address on Wednesday during
the official opening of the Fifth Session of the Ninth Parliament, President
Mnangagwa called for a peaceful election in the forthcoming harmonised
election. Herald
0 comments:
Post a Comment