Discrepancies in election figures contained in the Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission (Zec)’s own documents and signed by acting chief elections
officer, Utloile Silaigwana, are expected to be put to test by MDC Alliance
leader, Nelson Chamisa’s legal team led by Thabani Mpofu at the Constitutional
Court today as the opposition leader seeks to overturn President-elect Emmerson
Mnangagwa’s victory.
Chamisa, challenging the presidential results released by
Zec, pointed out that most of them did not add up, further denting the
credibility of the electoral body and raising more questions to the final tally
announced late last Thursday.
The seemingly embarrassing errors have been flagged by a
team of technical experts in the MDC Alliance and an independent human rights
and science data group Team Pachedu in separate reports.
Team Pachedu, which is not linked to the alliance, noted
that in a number of polling stations — using data from Zec source documents —
the total votes cast, votes rejected and total valid votes, did not match.
In Bikita East ward 16, which had six polling stations
where a total number of votes cast were 2 189, votes rejected were 54 — the
total number of valid votes was captured as 2 183, instead of 2 135.
These discrepancies are replicated in various
constituencies including Gokwe-Sengwa, Gokwe-Kana and other polling stations in
Harare.
In Zaka, a phenomenon that could make world records is
displayed in the results published by the electoral commission, where the
number of voters who cast their votes in two different wards is identical at
all polling stations and the voting patterns are also similar.
Team Pachedu said the Zaka West phenomenon was
statistically improbable and could only point to figures being “cooked up”.
“Zec defies probability theory, a sample of a duplicate
entry from Zec presidential data the example is statistically improbable. The
presidential results announced were, thus, inaccurate and there may be need for
an auditor to look into these figures,” Team Pachedu said.
In Zaka West ward 23, at Chiringeno Primary School polling
station, 330 people cast their votes, while the total number of valid votes was
given as 321.
In ward 22 at Harava business centre tent, 330 votes were
cast and 321 votes were valid, according to Zec.
Presidential candidates also got similar number of votes at
different polling stations, with Mnangagwa getting 160 votes at Harava and Chiringeno,
while Chamisa polled 139 votes at both polling stations.
Both ward 22 and 23 had four polling stations and each of
them had results in sync with another, same number of spoilt ballots, votes for
each candidate and same number of voters who turned up to vote.
In total, ward 22 recorded 1 438 voters, 58 spoilt votes
and 1 380 valid votes.
Mnangagwa polled 835 votes, while Chamisa got 447 votes,
which figures were similar to those recorded in ward 23, with no variation.
A presidential results projection from sample-based
observation report released by Zimbabwe Elections Support Network, (Zesn) notes
that there were polling stations where more votes, than registered voters were
cast.
“The SBO data shows overall turnout at 84,7%, with a margin
of error of 0,7%, with all provinces with turnout over 80%. There were 11
(1,5%) polling stations with turnout over 95% of which 5 (0,8%) had turnout of
100% or more,” the report, based on a sample of 750 polling stations, read.
One of the polling stations which had over 100% voter
turnout was in Zaka West in Masvingo at Manatsa business centre tent polling
station, which had 484 registered voters, but a total of 542 votes were cast on
election day.
Elections Resources Centre director Tawanda Chimhini said
the figures released by Zec were partial and showed some discrepancies, which
was a cause for concern.
“The figures have some discrepancies and this will be
detailed in our full report, however, it’s important to note that announced
results must tally for them to be credible. All release of results must be
accompanied by all necessary and official source documents to allow for
verifiable of the same. Such release must also include key details such as the
complete voters’ roll used on polling day,” he said.
Chimhini said this should be done in line with Zec’s
constitutional obligation to run the elections transparently.
“A partial release of information may easily be viewed as
an attempt to mask some inadequacies which will be unfortunate given the
growing tensions arising from the election,” he said. Newsday
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