The electoral commission has announced that eleven candidates would compete for the position of president of Zimbabwe in the August election after a number of contenders were disqualified for failing to raise the $20,000 required to be listed on the ballot.
Emmerson Mnangagwa, the incumbent leader of the ZANU-PF party, is anticipated to face pastor and lawyer Nelson Chamisa, the candidate with the most support from the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC), in the election.
Several of the optimistic candidates who failed to pay the $20,000 deposit to guarantee a spot on the ballot by Wednesday were among the 11 candidates who were declared ineligible for the August 23 election by the commission late on Thursday.
Linda Masarira, the only woman who had expressed interest in running for the position, was one of them.
“I have been clear that the $20,000 is exorbitant, it is discriminatory in nature and violates the section that speaks to non-discrimination in the eyes of the law,” she said.
“Democracy should never be for sale,” CCC spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere told newsmen. “
“What’s beyond doubt is that ZANU-PF is continuously anti-poor and trying to close citizen representatives out. That said, we won’t be deterred,” she said.
The same day also has elections for the parliament. Mnangagwa and Chamisa continue to be the front-runners to turn around the Southern African nation’s flagging economic prospects, but an independent candidate for president has recently surfaced.
Political observers predict that former Robert Mugabe cabinet minister and self-exiled Saviour Kasukuwere, who is running as an independent, will get support in ZANU-PF strongholds.
Kasukuwere previously harboured presidential aspirations before fleeing the nation after the revolution that toppled Mugabe.
Mnangagwa, 80, is running for reelection during an economic crisis that has seen the value of the Zimbabwe currency fall by more than 50% this month relative to the US dollar.
As he submitted his nomination at the High Court on Wednesday, Mnangagwa praised democracy.
“Countrywide the process is going very well and it shows that Zimbabwe is now a mature democracy. This process is so peaceful and that is what we want,” he said.
Chamisa, whose party is expected to win this election despite barely losing the previous one in 2018, has stated so.
