Chamisa meets Sadc team over polls

The Southern African Development Community (Sadc) on Friday said it will not 'sit and watch' Zimbabwe heading towards another violent and disputed election.

Opposition parties and civic groups have been complaining of an uneven playing field skewed in favour of the ruling Zanu-PF as the country prepares to hold watershed elections between July 26 and August 26.

Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) leader Nelson Chamisa on Friday met Sadc electoral advisor Likhwa Dlamini where they discussed a number of electoral issues

Chamisa has been complaining that biased authorities have been putting spanners into his campaign with police banning at least 63 CCC campaign meetings within a short period of time.

"Zimbabwe has always been violating those principles and guidelines as far as elections are concerned," Dlamini said after the meeting.

"Sadc is there to assess the likelihood of such incidents recurring, but our report does not address such issues and if they keep on recurring, there are other senior structures that deal with such issues.

"But Sadc will not sit down and watch this continuing.

"We are not going to use force or push through the throat everything that we think of.

"We are going to do it in a way that would make us remain brothers and sisters."

He said Sadc will prepare a report with recommendations as Zimbabwe nears the elections.

"Our presence here is to do an assessment and detect issues, which I think are of concern and then assist," said Dlamini.

"We will prepare a report as soon as we finish this mission and submit it to the chairperson of the ministerial committee of the organ and then it becomes a public document."

Chamisa called on Sadc to push the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to release the contentious voters' roll.

"We have been crying and we continue to cry," Chamisa said.

"We are not in agreement on the issues of the voters' roll and we are sharing this with our colleagues in Sadc.

"We would want a credible voters' roll in Zimbabwe.

" That voters' roll must be public, available, analysable and in searchable format.

"We should be able to audit that roll so that we are satisfied as it is a critical ingredient in order to have free and fair elections."

Chamisa said they did not want Zimbabwe to remain in a vicious cycle of disputed elections.

"We believe in African solutions to African problems," he said.

"That's why we continue to knock at the doors of Sadc because it is our aunty and uncle.

"We have prepared our document, the pre-election pact on elections and we made our humble view known to Sadc that we would want to have a political agreement and a political dialogue before elections by all political players in the country."

Chamisa also called on Sadc to intervene in the arrest of Zengeza West legislator Job Sikhala, who has been in detention for more than 300 days on charges of inciting violence which the opposition has dismissed as trumped up.

Last month, Mnangagwa said he would formally invite international observers after proclaiming election dates, but warned that he would not tolerate "undue interference" in the country's electoral processes.

The European Union said it was ready to send its election observer mission to Zimbabwe to ensure the country holds free and fair elections.