Zimbabwe's national elections, due in seven weeks' time, have been hastily organized, are already ridden with confusion and illegality and are unlikely to be free and fair, the Catholic Church warned Sunday.
President Robert Mugabe has set March 29 as the date for presidential, parliamentary and local government elections.
The statement by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP) in Zimbabwe, the country's longest serving human rights body, is the latest by several organizations to question the government's readiness to go the polls.
The statement said that the "prevailing electoral climate is not conducive to free and fair elections." It cited voter registration procedures that were "cumbersome" and that had meant that many people had not been able to register.
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For the first time, elections for all three fora are being held simultaneously, but preparation and voter education to explain the changes to the electorate had been "inadequate" with the result that "confusion continues to exist" as to how they are to be conducted.
Mugabe's announcement of the election date was just over two weeks ago, and there was "not enough time" for political parties to carry out their campaigns.
The delimitation report, setting out the different sets of constituencies for the parliamentary and local government elections, was published only last week, and voters were unclear about where they were to vote.
Private election watchdogs said that copies of the report had not been made available to the public, and those that had been obtained, did not have maps to show voters where their constituency or local government wards were situated.
Last week Mugabe was forced to postpone the day for nominations of candidates by a week until February 15 as a result of severe infighting in his party over who would stand as candidates.
The independent Standard reported Sunday that violence had broken out at ruling party primary elections, including one incident when Finance Minister Samuel Mumbengegwi had to fire a pistol against angry opponents who had stoned his car.
Sapa-dpa
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