ZEC removes 25 000 from voters roll

THE Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) has removed more than 25 000 deceased persons from the voters roll as the election management body cleans the roll to ensure that it reflects the correct number of voters.

The removal of deceased persons from the voters’ roll was announced by ZEC’s Acting Chief Elections Officer, Mr Simbarashe Tongayi in a Government Gazette published last Friday.

ZEC regularly and routinely removes dead voters from the roll as data from the Registrar-General is made available from the lists of people who have been certified as dead.

“It is hereby notified, in terms of section 33(4) read with section 27(1) of the Electoral Act (Chapter 2:13), that, voter registration officers have reason to believe that the persons whose names are listed in the First Schedule, and who were registered as voters for the constituencies, wards and polling stations listed therein have died.

“The names of those persons will be removed from the voters roll unless notice of appeal is given to the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission,” reads the notice.

“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.”

From the reading of the list ZEC has published, the bulk of those that are set to be removed died in 2024.

The list contains names of the deceased persons, their national identification number, gender, date of birth, address and the date when they died.

Other details include the deceased’s constituency, polling stations, district of origin and their province.

In an interview yesterday, ZEC Deputy Chairperson, Ambassador Rodney Kiwa said removing of deceased persons was routine, adding that it was important to have an up-to-date voter’s roll.

“We have to keep the voters roll as up to date as is possible and with the latest information particularly when we are set to have by-elections such as Glen View South or Gutu East constituency for example. To publish the names is important and it is a legal requirement because it affords persons to make objections should they be deemed as deceased by mistake. They will have to come forward to have it corrected,” said Amb Kiwa.

He said updating the voters roll also enabled to provide a proper and realistic threshold of total voters on a given polling station or constituency.

This, said Amb Kiwa, helps to ensure that candidates were not prejudiced by having fictitious figures.

“We have to keep the voters roll updated, otherwise we might end with a threshold per given polling station that does not exist.

“For example, we might set a threshold of 1 000 voters per polling station and if we do not update the voters roll, we might have, for example 40 percent of people deceased persons on a given polling station.

“This will result in the prejudice of candidates hence the importance of updating the voters roll,” said Amb Kiwa. The Chronicle