The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission is an independent body
created through parliamentary processes and does not take instructions from any
political party, President Mnangagwa has said.
President Mnangagwa said if there was any political party
not happy with the operations of the electoral body, it should approach the
courts for redress.
Addressing
multitudes of Zanu-PF supporters at the Mutare Aerodrome open space where he
was drumming up support ahead of the July 30 harmonised elections yesterday,
President Mnangagwa said Zec should follow the law in its operations.
His remarks followed unsubstantiated claims by MDC-Alliance
leader Mr Nelson Chamisa that Zec was working with Zanu-PF to rig the
elections.
“There was a Tsvangirai party called MDC-T. Now we have MDC
Alliance. MDC Alliance which is being led by Chamisa, MDC-T led by (Thokozani)
Khupe,” said President Mnangagwa.
“But this one called Alliance is the one complaining about
Zec and the voters’ roll. Zec is a
creation of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. Zec did not come from Zanu-PF. Zec
comes from the country’s Constitution. Zec is chosen and created by Parliament.
In Parliament the parliamentary committee chose Zec.
Chamisa was there and he is chairperson of the committee
that selected Zec which he is complaining about now. There is no law that says
there is a party that should tell Zec what to do. No. No Zec is created by the
Constitution of the Republic and its composition is created and composed through
a parliamentary committee and in that parliamentary committee Chamisa was one
of the co-chairpersons that created and composed Zec.”
President Mnangagwa continued: “Zec is an independent
commission. Government has no control on Zec at all. No political party at all
should give instructions to Zec. We in Zanu-PF observe the rule so we will
never give instructions to Zec. We expect, however, that Zec must follow the
law.
“It must follow and comply with the Electoral Act which
governs its functions. If there is any belief that Zec breached the Electoral
Act or the Constitution, the courts are open.
“It is not possible for political parties to say Zec do
this or that.”
President Mnangagwa said while Mr Chamisa was busy fighting
Zec, Zanu-PF should direct its efforts towards championing programmes that
improve the lives of the people.
He said out of the 23 Presidential candidates, it was only
Mr Chamisa who was complaining about the positioning of President Mnangagwa’s
name on the ballot paper, which is on number 15.
“Out of the 23 Presidential candidates, Zec says it will
use the alphabetical order using the surnames that we were given by our
fathers,” said President Mnangagwa.
“My name is Mnangagwa so it is on number 15 and his name is
Chamisa and is at the top but he is having sleepless nights over my name which
is on the bottom.
“So this issue of where a name is on the ballot paper is
his personal problem. We are concerned about 30 July where we will go and vote
in numbers, while they are demonstrating about where a name should be on the
ballot paper. While they are doing this we are talking to the people explaining
programmes taking place in the country, economic programmes, social programmes
to grow our economy, for making better the lives of our people in education, in
health, in infrastructure development, in agriculture, in tourism.
“These are the issues we must address to grow our country,
to modernise our country, to mechanise our country to bring our
biotechnologies, skills and foreign direct investment and to attract global
investment to Zimbabwe.”
President Mnangagwa explained that for almost 20 years
Zimbabwe was in isolation due to economic sanctions but the country had
embarked on a re-engagement drive to reposition itself in the community of
nations.
He said the country was receiving positive signals from the
outside world which saw it securing more than US$16 billion in investment
commitments in six months.
“For close to 20 years, Zimbabwe was in isolation because
sanctions were imposed on this country,” said President Mnangagwa.
“Why were sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe? Commonwealth in
2000 said we should not proceed with our land reform programme. As Zanu-PF we
sat down in Masvingo to say we must choose whether we must go ahead with the
land reform which was the major grievance of our liberation struggle or we obey
the Commonwealth and we abandon the land reform.
“We chose to go ahead with our land reform and sanctions
were imposed on us. The issue of sanctions and land reform are now behind us,
we now have our country.”
The rally was also attended by Vice President Constantino
Chiwenga, Zanu-PF national chair Cde Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri and several
Politburo members. Herald
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