The Election Resource Centre (ERC), an independent election watchdog, has denied claims made by Zimbabwe’s ruling party, ZANU PF, that it received foreign funding from the West to train election agents. The ERC stated that training election agents was not part of its mandate.
ZANU PF’s finance boss, Patrick Chinamasa, claimed that ERC and the Zimbabwe Election Support Network (Zesn) had received foreign funding to train election agents, allegedly provided by the United Kingdom, France, Australia, USAID, Sweden, the United States embassy in Harare, US-based National Democratic Institute and the European Union.
The ERC refuted these claims, stating that it was neither aware of the donation nor part of such a programme as alleged by ZANU PF. Said the election watchdog in a statement:
Unfortunately, this statement from Zanu PF is not true with regards to ERC. As ERC we, therefore, put it on record that we are neither aware of the donation nor are we part of such a programme as alleged by Zanu PF.
As a law-abiding entity, we continue striving for electoral excellence, our mission as ERC is to provide credible information, strategic services and deliberative platforms that aim to improve the quality of democracy and elections at all tiers of Zimbabwean society and Africa at large.
The ERC is a think-tank and advocacy organisation on electoral and democracy issues in Africa, having been formed following the need to deepen electoral research work in Africa that would inform effective citizen participation as well as strengthen policy engagement towards improvement of the quality of electoral and democratic practices.
ZESN, which also dismissed the claims made by ZANU PF, reiterated that it does not finance or train any political party agents as this is not part of its core business and mandate. ZESN restated that it does not provide funding or training for political party agents and does not endorse any political party or candidate in Zimbabwe. It said its core business and mandate is to promote democratic elections in Zimbabwe through domestic oversight on all electoral processes including voter registration, nomination, pre- and post-electoral environment, and polling day processes, among others.