Transfer Of Voters’ Roll To Registrar-General’s Office Will Improve Efficiency – ZEC
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) says Constitutional Amendment Act No. 3, which, among other things, transfers voter registration and the compilation and maintenance of the voters’ roll to the Registrar-General’s Office while establishing the Zimbabwe Electoral Delimitation Commission, will strengthen the country’s electoral management framework by streamlining operations and improving efficiency.
Black News 
ZEC Chief Elections Officer Simbarashe Tongayi told ZBC News the new framework will enhance operational efficiency.
“The Constitutional Amendment Act Number 3 is a good law because it streamlines the core functions of the electoral management body to focus on two key issues: conducting free and fair elections and voter education. This improves operational efficiency and streamlines functions,” he said.
“The Registrar-General already has the necessary information required for the voters’ roll, so this improves efficiency because we were obtaining that information from them in any case.”
During the last general election cycle, ZEC faced several accusations, among them gerrymandering.
Gerrymandering is the deliberate drawing of electoral boundaries to give a political party or group an unfair advantage.
In 2023, opposition parties and analysts accused the commission of drawing boundaries that disproportionately favoured ZANU-PF, including allocating 143 constituencies to communal lands and 67 to urban and peri-urban areas.
Other accusations included using the wrong formula to calculate voter variations, leaving some constituencies with more than 20,000 voters while others had far fewer, and claims that the entire delimitation process was unconstitutional.
The move to transfer voter registration and management of the voters’ roll from ZEC to the Registrar-General’s Office has drawn mixed reactions.
Proponents say the Registrar-General already manages the civil registry, including births, deaths, identity documents and citizenship. This, they argue, would make it technically easier to maintain an accurate and continuously updated voters’ roll, with deceased voters automatically removed and those turning 18 added once they obtain IDs.
However, opponents argue that the Registrar-General’s Office is a department under the Ministry of Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage and therefore directly under the Executive.
ZEC, at least on paper, is an independent Chapter 12 commission under the Constitution. Moving the roll from an independent commission to a government department, critics say, would reduce rather than increase independence.
