Zanu-PF targets virgins

Zanu-PF will officially launch its 2018 harmonised elections campaign after its National people's Conference in December this year, party National Political Commissar Saviour Kasukuwere has said.

The ruling party has been flexing its mobilisation muscle with a string of oversubscribed nationwide Presidential Youth Interface Meetings.

Zanu-PF recently concluded commissariat workshops in all 10 provinces on voter education and registration campaign, and Kasukuwere told The Sunday Mail that these would now trickle down to other party structures as part of the preparations for the plebiscite.

Kasukuwere said district, ward and cell meetings were underway across Zimbabwe as part of voter registration and education campaigns.

He said: "What we were basically doing was to take the message of the new biometric voter registration system and to encourage all our party members to register.

"Now what they are doing is taking these messages to the districts, the wards and the cells so that the message gets to the grassroots.

"They will also be holding mini campaign rallies to encourage people to register as voters. This way we will also be gauging the party's strength from the grassroots going up.

"This way we expect the proper nationwide campaigning to begin in January ahead of the elections. Already our structures in provinces that include Manicaland and Mashonaland West are already holding rallies."

Zanu-PF has appointed an elections directorate - composed of senior Politburo members - which is seized with the party's 2018 elections roadmap.

The ruling party is targeting over five million votes in the polls.

Part of party's election strategy entails ensuring all current members in various structures register to vote, while a massive drive to lure first-time youth voters is also being rolled out.

The strategy targets, among others, students at higher and tertiary institutions, who constitute a large chunk of new voters ().

A Politburo committee made up of technocrats has been established to draft a campaign manifesto, whose message will centre on economic revival, peace and stability, employment creation and development, among other things.

The manifesto will also focus on engineering economic success through homegrown solutions like the Presidential Inputs Support Scheme and Command Agriculture.