Zimbabwe will this year embark on a delimitation exercise, to be run by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC). This is a critical exercise for elections, as it determines the boundaries constituencies and where voters will vote.
Here is a fact sheet on delimitation:
What is delimitation?
Delimitation is the process of dividing the country into constituencies and wards for the purposes of national elections, such as the National Assembly, or ward elections to choose councilors. For Members of Parliament, the delimitation process divides the country into 210 constituencies, which is the number of MPs that sit in the House of Assembly.
When is it done?
Typically, delimitation is done once every 10 years, and it is scheduled soon after a national census. A census helps ZEC to find out how many people live in an area. The process is also carried out after voter registration exercises.
What data is used for delimitation?
ZEC uses the number of registered voters as well as census data to come up with constituency boundaries.
The process has been done in phases. First was a voter registration phase that ran in February, then another voter registration blitz that ran in April. After these voter registration processes, ZEC comes up with an updated voters’ roll.
Factors that ZEC considers include:
- An area’s physical features
- The means of communication within the area
- the geographical distribution of registered voters
- any community of interest as between registered voters;
When will the process end?
With the voters’ roll, together with the Census Report, ZEC will start the delimitation process. For 2022, the Census Report is expected in August 2022. According to a ZEC schedule, the delimitation process will be done from September to November. In December, boundaries will be put up for approval. Preliminary reports will be produced, before a final report is presented to the President by the end of March 2023.
After that, the President will gazette a Delimitation Proclamation. This gives legal effect to the new constituency and ward boundaries.
What do latest voter registration figures mean for this process?
ZEC on July 5 released a report showing registered voters after the last registration exercise. The number of the voters will determine how constituencies will be distributed.
Harare metropolitan has almost one million registered voters while Matabeleland South has the lowest with only 267,000. This could mean that areas with low voter registration, such as Matabeleland South and Bulawayo, may lose constituencies.
