Opinion / Columnist
FULL TEXT: UFP blasts ZEC over nomination fees
29 Aug 2022 at 10:21hrs | Views
We are again faced with the ugly head of an intolerant regime reeling its head in the democratic space of Zimbabweans. The contestation of elections is a constitutional right in Zimbabwe but the recent increase in nomination fees by ZEC surely eliminates this right and reduces the whole electoral process to a preserve of the rich. It is not only shocking and appalling but also an embodiment of a regime that is using every hook and crook means to stay in power. What ZEC helped to bring to the fore is that ZANU PF is in a panic mode.
We have a regime that knows exactly how its influence has waned. UFP, together with other like-minded democratic parties, are against this unconstitutional attempt to monopolise the democratic space in Zimbabwe.
Where Professor Lumumba said "those with ideas have no power…." ZEC has gone a step further to show that those without money have no power.
Nomination to public office should be based on the social capital and on the ideas that resonate with the people. Representing the wishes of the people should never be monetised, certainly not to that level as proposed by ZEC. What ZEC is trying to do is emptying the already empty pockets of opposition parties to try and eliminate any competition. Surely $500000 plus is a lot of money by any standards for any political party, but of course we have a ZANUPF that receives money from the state, a Mwonzora led MDC that is suckling from the financial tits of ZANU PF and these have a corrupt means of raising the money and in most cases at the hands of the suffering masses in Zimbabwe.
This is just a ploy to keep out all promising parties and leaders from contesting in the coming elections.
Questions are then raised on whether the electoral body really incurs such high costs in running the elections or whether the budget allocated to it by the state isn't that enough? All this translates to one key observation that UFP has always maintained; that we Zimbabweans are prisoners in our own land and because of such prohibitive laws that are set up to bring untold suffering and pain, everyone is born into this imprisonment and we are serving jail time for crimes we never committed.
Such a move must be opposed and dismissed with the contempt it deserves.
We have a regime that knows exactly how its influence has waned. UFP, together with other like-minded democratic parties, are against this unconstitutional attempt to monopolise the democratic space in Zimbabwe.
Where Professor Lumumba said "those with ideas have no power…." ZEC has gone a step further to show that those without money have no power.
This is just a ploy to keep out all promising parties and leaders from contesting in the coming elections.
Questions are then raised on whether the electoral body really incurs such high costs in running the elections or whether the budget allocated to it by the state isn't that enough? All this translates to one key observation that UFP has always maintained; that we Zimbabweans are prisoners in our own land and because of such prohibitive laws that are set up to bring untold suffering and pain, everyone is born into this imprisonment and we are serving jail time for crimes we never committed.
Such a move must be opposed and dismissed with the contempt it deserves.
Source - UFP
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