Journalist Hopewell Chin’ono said that CCC and its leader Nelson Chamisa are making a mistake by focusing on the presidential election results in arguing that the 2023 Harmonised Elections results were rigged.
Chin’ono said CCC is challenging the presidential election results instead of challenging the whole election process.
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Chin’ono said the international community has chosen to focus on the flawed electoral process.
He warned CCC that if they do not possess the V11 forms from all polling stations to prove that the presidential result was rigged, “that is the end of the story.” Wrote Chin’ono:
The Zimbabwean election has two contentious issues, the process and the presidential results dispute.
The international community has chosen to focus on the flawed process whilst the Zimbabwean opposition is concentrating on the disputed presidential figures.
Most African ambassadors who support SADC’s preliminary report are however confused by the opposition’s focus on results from a flawed election with glaring irregularities.
They are saying that if the opposition says it won, it becomes difficult to sustain the flawed election argument that the United Nations has taken.
They argue that the issue becomes about election results and that if the opposition fails to produce the V11s for every polling station, that is the end of the story.
The opposition says it has all the V11s as its leader Nelson Chamisa says in this video statement, so all concerned are now waiting for the production of the V11s that confirm a Nelson Chamisa victory.
The opposition has deliberately said less about annulling the whole election, something that the international community thought would be a more powerful argument.
Some in the opposition have argued that this is because parliament comes with money for the party, which means that annulling the elections takes away the money whilst the dispute is being resolved.
Whilst the observer missions agree that there were glaring election day irregularities, they also argue that if the CCC dispute is going to be about election results, then there is very little they can do without V11s for every polling station.
SADC Ambassadors have privately defended the SADC observer team mission preliminary report.
They are calling for an even tougher final report, but they are saying that is where it will end because the opposition accepts the parliamentary results, and its dispute is on the presidential result.
They are saying CCC can’t trash the whole election whilst accepting part of the results from the same election.
In short, without producing V11s from all polling stations, that is the end of the story.
It would have been more powerful to dismiss the whole electoral process, but CCC has taken a different route of focusing on the presidential result.
All concerned are now waiting for the production of the V11s, that is where this election study is now at, without which that will be the end of the story.
Addressing a Press conference in Harare on Sunday, 27 August, Chamisa said CCC was in possession of the V11 and V23B forms, whose results were different from those used by Zec to declare Mnangagwa the winner.
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