Electoral Amendment Bill denies diaspora vote

By Kumbirai T Muchemwa

The Electoral Amendment Bill that has been passed by the Parliament of Zimbabwe denies Zimbabwean citizens outside the country the right to participate in national elections. The MDC SA is greatly disappointed to say the least with the outcome.

Patrick Chinamasa, the ZANU PF representative who presented the Bill in Parliament and was also chosen by his party to oversee injustice in the country attempted to apply lipstick on this particular pig without much success.

The reasons he gave for this specific injustice can only come from a man who either lives in a cocoon or is just a wretched and reprehensible liar.

Chinamasa and his aged boss know what they need to do if they want the self-inflicted sanctions to be lifted. Zimbabweans in the diaspora have nothing at all to do the imposition or removal of those measures.

His comment on the capacity of the country to have polling stations in the countries where Zimbabweans reside is disingenuous. Zimbabwe has embassies and consulates in many countries as a starting point. We in the diaspora cannot be expected to provide answers on how the Government should fund elections.

We will, however, encourage him to properly account for all Government monies that pass through his ministry. We cannot accept that a man who is either simply incompetent in his duty of accounting for public funds or is willingly diverting such funds can stand up and declare that the same Government has no money.

The Comptroller and Auditor-General is still awaiting for answers from Chinamasa as shown below.

As for the Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs, the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) said she could not establish whether or not all the receipts, payments, vehicle accessories and advances were properly accounted for as the ministry did not maintain a cash book, vehicle register, travel and subsistence register.

For six successive years, the Justice Ministry had also not complied with the auditors’ recommendation to keep a master asset register.

ZANU PF through its gross mismanagement of the country caused millions of Zimbabweans to leave their beloved homes and seek refuge and/or opportunities in other countries. It is the continued insistence of ZANU PF on the politics of negativity and refusal to implement agreed upon positions in the GNU that stops Zimbabweans from returning home.

That the same shell of a party now insists people it chased away cannot vote is a calamity of monumental proportions. Voting is a right that should be granted by being a citizen of country and not where you are in the world. It is a right and not a privilege.

The MDC SA will continue to engage and pursue all possible avenues to get what is rightfully ours.

The people’s struggle for real change: Let’s finish it!!

Kumbirai T Muchemwa, Secretary for Information and Publicity, MDC SA External Assembly