The Sunday Mail
Tau Tawengwa
Urban areas are perhaps more likely to experience voter apathy because of a lack of tangible benefits for voting.
The 2018 election is perhaps the most interesting poll in Zimbabwe’s history for several reasons
It is the first election in the country’s history that does not include Mr Robert Mugabe on the ballot paper..
Secondly, in this election, the predominance of voters are below the age of 40 — about 60 percent in fact.
For that reason, some politicians are putting their money on youthful candidates prevailing at ward and constituency levels. The logic that youthful candidates will prevail on that basis alone is misguided. Elections are complex processes, and voter patterns and behaviours are equally complex.
A number of factors come into play when attempting to deduce voter patterns within the various demographics in the forthcoming elections.
I will attempt to discuss some of those factors here.
Age and region
Around 5,3 million Zimbabweans have registered to vote in the 2018 elections. For the 2013 elections, 5,8 million people registered to vote.
Within the 5,3 million registered voters, there are three subgroups: non-voters (those who are registered but don’t vote), occasional voters (those who don’t always vote), and regular voters (those who vote in every election).
It is often the case that the regular voters are older people (or the 40 percent who are over 40 years old and above) and this group consists of people who have a sense of civic duty and citizenship.
Those who have registered to vote for the first time are an erratic group, partly because it is not guaranteed that first-time voters will spend election-day in queues waiting for their turn to vote.
In fact, there is a high chance that many youthful first-time voters will treat election day as a holiday and take the day off.
It is indisputable that the figure of 5,3 million registered voters was arrived at over a period of years.
Therefore, it is highly unlikely that 5,3 million voters will turn out at polling stations on election day, especially considering that the 2013 harmonised elections saw only 59 percent of registered voters turning up.
Furthermore, the generally held “rational model” for judging voter participation suggests that individuals will decide to vote when the benefits of voting exceed the cost of voting.
This means that voters will participate in elections when they feel they have something tangible to gain or lose.
In light of this, we are likely to experience a high voter turnout in agricultural and rural areas, which consist largely of people who have benefited from land reforms or farming inputs.
These people will turn out in their numbers because they have something tangible to gain or lose.
Urban areas are perhaps more likely to experience voter apathy because of a lack of tangible benefits for voting.
It is likely that Harare Metropolitan and Bulawayo Metropolitan will suffer from voter apathy among first-time voters.
Gender
While some put forward the argument that 60 percent of voters are below the age of 40, they are forgetting to mention that about 54 percent of our national population consists of women.
Let’s assume that 54 percent of registered voters (even those below the age of 40) are women, and this will have a significant impact on the electoral outcome.
Research from different parts of the world reveals that women vote at higher rates than men. Furthermore, It is also my perception that a significant number of women voters relate to women candidates irrespective of political affiliation, primarily because women address and understand issues relating to women far much more than men do.
For this reason, we may find that women voters may prefer to choose female candidates at ward, and constituency levels.
Political affiliation
I think it is fair to say that historically in Zimbabwe, the members of a political party will automatically vote for their party.
Of course, there have been incidents where this did not happen such as the 2008 “bhora musango” campaign which saw traditional Zanu-PF members voting for their ward and constituency candidates, but not for their Presidential candidate.
In 2018, I do not foresee a “bhora-musango”. However, MDC-T’s political infighting that has occurred over the last few months may see the Nelson Chamisa-led MDC-Alliance lose a significant number of votes among party members, particularly in the Matebeleland regions.
As things stand, it still seems Zanu-PF has the upper hand.
