Striking similarities in Kenya, Zimbabwe electoral histories

By Suba Churchill

On Wednesday, as many as 6.4 million registered Zimbabwean voters go to the polls to elect their President, Members of the National Assembly and local government representatives in what has become known locally as the first harmonised elections.

Previously, presidential elections used not to be held at the same time as National Assembly elections. But all these will now be taking place simultaneously under the new constitution proclaimed on May 22 in what is turning out to be the most peaceful elections ever held in Zimbabwe in recent times.

Already, some 37, 308 voters cast their ballots during the Special Vote, an advanced arrangement made for security officials, election personnel and other government officials likely to be displaced from their voter registration centres while on assignment during the main polling day.

Additional 26, 106 of the 60, 956 who had applied to cast their ballot during the Special Vote but who were not able to do so due to logistical hiccups have been allowed to do so after the election management body, ZEC sought the leave of the constitutional court to administer the vote.

Zimbabwe’s political, constitution making and electoral history has striking similarities with Kenya in many respects. Like Kenya, Zimbabwe was also colonised by the British.

Democratic march

But it is Zimbabwe’s march to a more democratic and inclusive post-independence governance in recent times that almost mirrors similar happenings in Kenya.

When post-election violence broke out in Kenya in early 2008, the events that followed the brokerage of the National Peace Accord (NPA) that led to a power-sharing deal between former President Mwai Kibaki and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga informed a similar power-sharing arrangement between President Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tvangirai under the Global Political Agreement (GPA), ushering in the Government of National Unity or inclusive government in 2009.

Zimbabwe’s independence constitution was also hammered at the famous Lancaster House in London, creating a bi-cameral Parliament with a Senate and a House of Assembly and a justiciable Bill of Rights.

Like Kanu and Kadu in Kenya, the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) and PF-Zapu that had been protagonists in the country’s first multi-racial elections in 1980 merged to create a Parliamentary majority, and amended the constitution at will to create a de facto one-party state.

Increasing poverty, a debilitating three-week civil servants strike in 1996 and trade unionism riding on the crest of disenchantment with economic structural adjustment programmes forced the government to embark on a constitution making project.

And just as it happened in Kenya in 2005 when the LDP wing of Narc campaigned against the government draft constitution, the MDC and the civil society in Zimbabwe successfully campaigned for a “no” vote against a government constitution in the 2000 constitutional referendum.

There are 210 constituencies in Zimbabwe from which the House of Assembly will be elected, just as in Kenya before the increase to 290 recently.

Where the Constitution of Kenya 2010 creates special seats in each of the 47 Counties for women, the first two Parliaments after the introduction of the new constitution in Zimbabwe will have additional 60 women (six each from the ten provinces) members elected through women-only party-list proportionate representation based on the strength of each party in the National Assembly.

Like the famous Agenda Four Reforms in Kenya, Zimbabwe’s Government of National Unity (GNU) had its own slate of reforms to be undertaken before another election could be held. These reforms were underwritten by the African Union and the increasingly powerful Southern Africa Development Cooperation (SADC).