We Will Not Issue Voters' Roll With Photographs Because of Privacy, Security Reasons: Chigumba

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission chairperson Justice Priscilla Chigumba has said that the electoral body will not issue a voters’ roll with photos to contesting parties because of security and privacy reasons. She said that this was meant to protect the electorate as some unnamed individuals had threated to track down “their victims’ door to door.” Addressing the media on Monday, Chigumba said,

The public is being advised that the voters’ roll being distributed by the Commission is authentic.  Our lawyers advised us that providing a voter’s roll with photos of registered voters was a violation of privacy and not necessary according to the constitution since it was going to be online…Following threats by some unscrupulous individuals to track down their victims’ door to door, the Commission will not issue the voters’ roll with photographs in an effort to protect voters.

However, the Commission will print voters’ rolls with photographs for every polling station. Section 20(5) of the Electoral Act states that in the event of any discrepancy between an electronic copy and a printed copy of a voters’ roll, the latter shall be deemed to be the authentic record of the voters’ roll.

However, critics have pointed out that it is illogical for Zec to refuse to put people’s photographs when it is already providing information which is actually more difficult to access such as dates of birth and national identification numbers and addresses.