Talk is cheap, go and vote

Zanu-PF youths should go beyond making verbal expressions of support for President Mugabe, and should go a step further and register with the relevant authorities so that they can vote for him in next year's elections, the ruling party's Secretary for the Youth League, Kudzanai Chipanga, has said.

Chipanga said the massive turnout at Presidential Youth Interface Meetings was pleasing, and this should translate into actual votes come 2018.

He was speaking in Bindura yesterday as the Presidential Youth Interfaces moved into Mashonland Central.

". . . of major importance is that they (youths) have promised that they will rally behind the party's sole candidate President Mugabe in the next elec- tion.

"But that promise alone is not enough as long as the youth and general membership are not registered to vote. We as the youth want our members to take advantage of the forthcoming exercise by Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to register as voters for the next elections."

President Mugabe last Friday gazetted a notice stating that countrywide voter registration would start this week.

Also in Bindura yesterday, Zanu-PF Mashonaland Central youth chair Isaiah Mandaza said ruling party members in the province faced difficulties in getting national identity documents, which are an integral part of the electoral system.

"We ask the Registrar-General's Office in this province to ease their operations as most people now fear the office because of the bad reception they give, especially to the elderly," said Mandaza.

"We want our members to get national identity documents so that in the next election we maintain our track record of not losing a single seat."

Mandaza added that youths in the province were not fully benefitting from the empowerment agenda, especially in the minerals extraction sector.

"We have makorokoza who are saying they want to be registered to operate within the confines of the laws but the processes are difficult," said Ma- ndaza.

"The Government should give makorokoza a platform to mine as long as they sell the gold to Fidelity (the State's gold-buying arm). The same applies to offer letters for land which many youth who are in the farms farms are yet to get."