The list of the deceased persons was published in the
Government Gazette under General Notice 1197 of 2022 by the chief elections
officer, Mr Utloile Silaigwana.
Apart from publishing the names of deceased persons, Mr
Silaigwana also published the constituencies, wards and polling stations they
were registered under.
“The names of those persons will be removed from the voters
roll unless notice of appeal is given to the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission. By
means of this notice, notification is made to any voter on the First Schedule
who may be alive to lodge an objection at the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission
Mahachi Quantum, 1, Nelson Mandela Avenue, corner Kaguvi Street and Jason Moyo
Avenue, Harare, and at the respective Commission Provincial Offices, to the
inclusion of his or her name in the First Schedule using the form prescribed in
the Second Schedule no later than seven days from the date of publication of
this notice,” Mr Silaigwana said.
In an interview, ZEC spokesperson Mr Jasper Mangwana said
the electoral body adheres to its constitutional mandate and always removes
names of dead people from the voters’ roll.
“The commission has always been gazetting names of the
deceased persons to ensure that if there is any objection to the removal of
these people from the voters’ roll it is brought to the attention of the
Commission”.
He said this is a continuous process that the commission
has always been doing when it receives a list of deceased persons from the
Registrar General.
“We then check for those that are on the voters’ roll and
we then advertise that if there is any objection considering that these days
there are issues of identity theft. If someone objects to the removal of the
deceased persons from the roll because they are alive, that is corrected.
“This is just the process the Commission does after the
gazetting. If there’s no objection then the Commission will proceed to remove
this person from the voters’ roll”.
With such due diligence followed, Mr Mangwana said issues
around ghost voters are merely sideshows.
“How do they vote if they are not alive? Who is going to
approach a polling station if they are dead? So the process is very clear and
promotes the integrity of the voters roll”.
However, there are challenges for the Commission because
not everyone is interested in obtaining a death certificate, thus in some
instances the names of deceased persons might not be struck off from the
voters’
roll.
“The Commission is allowing other stakeholders or relatives
to bring to our attention deaths of individuals that can assist us to have a
clean roll,” said Mr Mangwana. Herald
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