By-Elections Update: Former Harare Mayor Herbert Gomba Re-elected
Former Harare Mayor, Councillor Herbert Gomba, has been re-elected as Harare Ward 27 councillor defeating ZANU PF’s and MDC Alliance’s candidates.
Gomba who was representing the newly-formed Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) polled 2851 votes while the ZANU PF representative attained 779.
The MDC Alliance candidate got 198.
Gomba was recalled in 2020 by the opposition MDC-T which claimed that he had “ceased to belong to the Movement for Democratic Change which is a member of the Movement for Democratic Alliance which was formed in terms of the constitutive agreement…”
The MDC-T, armed with a 2020 Supreme Court ruling on the MDC leadership crisis case ruling that reinstated Thokozani Khupe as the party’s leader, on an interim basis, has been recalling legislators and councillors aligned to Nelson Chamisa.
Out of the 28 parliamentary seats that were up for grabs in the 26 March 2022 by-elections, 18 fell vacant by recalls by MDC-T. Meanwhile, 121 local government seats were up for grabs most of which became vacant by recalls by MDC-T.
Gomba who is perjury and breaches after he allegedly supplied false information when registering as a voter, is currently out on bail.
The state says the 45-year-old registered as a voter at Ruvheneko Primary School in Glen Norah in 2017 by providing an address where he was not ordinarily resident.
The state further alleges that between October and December 31, 2017, 22 more individuals submitted affidavits while registering as voters also listing the same residential address as Gomba. Nine of the registrants share a surname with Gomba.
The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) alleges that the 22 were not residents at the stated house consisting of four rooms, including two bedrooms and a combined kitchen, dining room, and lounge.
