Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) deputy director for voter education, Taurai Gavi has revealed that his organisation is worried about the size of the ballot papers that will be used for the 2018 harmonised elections. Zec is hoping that the number of candidates will go down when candidates have to pay nomination fees which have not been gazetted yet. So far 124 people have said they will run for the presidency.
Speaking to journalists, Gavi said,
We have received 124 notifications, as of yesterday, of political parties that want to contest for the presidency…The high number of presidential contestants is an indication that the democratic space has been opened in the new dispensation and in a new Zimbabwe, it seems everyone also wants to be a president. However, it comes with challenges to us and the challenges that we are likely to face are to do with the ballot paper. How big is it going to be?
This is a sizeable number, but we hope some will be limited by the nomination fees, which are yet to be gazetted.
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