Came across this photo and couldn’t help but think of Dumiso Dabengwa “working strenuously” to  block Morgan Tsvangirai’s march to State House back in 2008. The photo shows PF-Zapu supporters during the 1980 elections.

The Research and Advocacy Unit, “outlawed” yesterday from holding a public voter’s roll audit says an eye-popping 2 million Zimbabweans failed to have names included on the voter’s roll during the voter registration exercise, while another 1 million mysterious names appear in the register.

A young man doing some degree at the Chinhoyi University of Technology told me the other day he went along with his dad to register, and when they got to the queue they were given “tickets” with numbers apparently to ensure no wise guys jumped the queue.

But the young man complained that while his dad was given a ticket numbered 220, he was given one numbered 651, never mind that he was standing behind his dad!

He thought it was a bad joke and now he finds himself missing his democratic right to vote!

He is certainly one of many of the 2 million RAU says will not vote despite being eligible, and as Tsvangirai has said, no matter who wins, this election will not be legitimate.

How can it be when many people will not be able to vote, not because they have lost faith in the whole process of elections being the only way to determine their future, but because the system literally shut them out.

Increasingly, Zimbabwe’s political pulse is palpable everywhere, with one soldier the other day saying rather cynically, “do you have to wear a T-shirt to show which party you support? I know who I will vote for.”

And then he joined other colleagues in lamenting the state of the nation.

It was obvious what he was talking about.

Yet one continues to hear uncorroborated claims that the security forces are fully behind the revolutionary party.

Could be true, but then “security forces” is too broad.

What we however know for certain is that it is the vultures who have stripped the land of its wealth, who have built mansions, who have enjoyed overseas trips while privates (sic) and corporals who know damn well they will never be homeowners, have become the laughing stock of an equally impoverished population.

Never mind that back in the 1980s being a soldier was envied as a well-salaried career of choice.

I recall as young boys back in the day envying the local older lads who had joined the military and from whom we came to know “tinned beef,” a type of food that was enough to convince young minds that being a soldier was “the life!”

You see, these soldiers always brought home tinned beef “from work” and it seemed so exciting that you could carry a gun in hand and tinned beef in the other, talk about romanticizing the army life!

I sniggered the other day when a colleague’s four year old daughter was reciting stuff she had learnt at kindergarten and when she arrived at the “when I grow up” part said with the innocence of a child: “when I grow up I want to be a soldier.”

I recalled how young men from Matebeleland have shunned recruitment to the barracks over the years, with impassioned pleas from Zanu PF political leaders in the region for the young Matebeles to join in the fight to protect the country’s sovereignty. These please have fallen on deaf ears!

Thus it is that the special vote count will be eagerly watched, and it would be interesting that the rioting cops were actually determined to keep the status quo!

The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) continues to raise concerns about incredible flaws that have come to define preparations for the 31 July elections, with the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission being exposed as unacceptably unprepared for an exercise of this magnitude.

And these have already cast doubts about the credibility of the poll, not only from CSOs, but perhaps more interestingly from some political parties who themselves are in this contest.

On 15 July, ZESN issued a press statement that highlighted the huge task ahead that still has to be done for the country to avoid yet another disputed poll outcome and all this in the next two weeks!

The “special vote” that has been widely publicised for its chaos has become the pointer of the worst that could happen on the 31 st July, with ZESN noting that “during the two days of the special voting, ZESN observers deployed at all special voting polling centres noted that the process was marred by serious logistical challenges countrywide. ZESN notes that the process continues to be disorganised an indication that ZEC was unprepared to conduct the special voting process.”

It stands to reason that if ZEC struggled with 60,000 voters, what then about the millions eligible to vote on 31 July, and this is surely a legitimate concern recalling that some members of the uniformed forces went berserk after frustrations ran high because of delays to allow them to vote.

Interesting that it is the riot police known for their brute force in dealing with civilians from soccer fans to WOZA who were called in to control their “riotous” colleagues!

ZESN noted that “on Sunday 14 July 2013, ZESN observers reported challenges that included the late opening of polling stations, shortage of sensitive voting materials such as indelible ink, ZEC stamps, approved voters’ lists, ballot papers and ballot boxes.”

Imagine the millions of people who are eagerly waiting for the 31 st July being frustrated by these logistical nightmares, the riot police will surely be kept busy, and we all know the favoured weapons of these brutal cops.

“ZESN is seriously concerned that the chaos that prevailed during the special voting process serves as a telling and worrying indicator that could repeat itself on 31 July,” ZESN said.

And it is not just ZESN concerned but all progressives who want to a see a smooth process despite all the stacks against this rushed election.

Many indeed see these elections as a chance for the country’s renewal from years of pillaging and intolerance by the “founding fathers”, but it is certain there are just too many spanners that are deliberately being thrown into the works by the usual suspects.

It’s always fascinating trying to understand why people choose to vote for a particular party, and as the political rallies hot up with Mugabe scaling down his itinerary, political party colours have become vogue, never mind that some wear these T-shirts emblazoned with party leader effigies for reasons that have nothing to do with political affiliation but everything to do with the area they find themselves in.

But it is another thing altogether to get convincing responses concerning how one arrives at choosing the political party to support.

I sat with two young men over the weekend who were preparing to go to an MDC-T rally somewhere in the capital.

They proudly wore the party colours and were literally fired up for the occasion. Opposite them sat another young man who wore a Zanu PF cap that bears the image of Robert Mugabe.

And then the two young men felt compelled to pour out to me why they were so passionate about the party they had chosen to support.

I was told one was a pharmacist, while the other said he had done some management degree at the University of Zimbabwe.

“Look at me my brother, I am wearing my younger brother’s jeans because he has more money than me but I am more educated than him,” one of them with the UZ education said. I looked at him and indeed the pair of jeans was that kind of tight fit with “borrowed” written all over them!

“For me, the MDC-T is the only party that might give me a chance to get the job I trained for. Look at this guy, he is a pharmacist but works at a supermarket,” he said referring to his colleague.

And the colleague went into a long tirade about his circumstances, why he felt Zanu PF had outlived its usefulness, if it ever had any.

These were two angry young men for whom the future of the country rests in new ideas that will spring them from their misery despite all the education they boast.

The other chap wearing the Zanu PF cap seemed amused and had no input whatsoever, but then it turns out these are chaps from the same neighbourhood for whom tolerance of divergent political views perhaps comes naturally.

As we sat, along came this other guy who told a third older man that there was a Zanu PF rally across the road, “why don’t you come along?”

The older man responded, “look who I am sitting with,” pointing at the red T-shirts the young men were wearing. “You should join us instead. Why are you going to the Zanu PF rally in the first place?”

I saw the chap blush and he responded: “Ah, ndinongondzwa chiyifarira.”

And that was the end of it.

It got me thinking about all the manifestos that the parties have put out, if at all the ordinary party supporters actually read through them to decide their vote, yet some of the issues that came out from encounters with these young folks were based on the pragmatic, such as the demand for jobs by these two “educated” lads.

That’s why many find it laughable that a party that has been in power for 33 years can today talk about unlocking a USD2 trillion economy.

These become nothing but wild numbers that the new crop of young voters will interrogate and when a guy like Kasukuwere says “we are emancipating our people,” the younger voters laugh and dismiss him as a fraud.

Yet, as everything during elections, politicians will say all sorts of nonsense to woo voters, and what this country certainly needs right now are enlightened voters. But then a corollary of that would be, are there any enlightened political parties?

/It is always sad to come face to face with young people who choose to own other people’s anger and vindictiveness without interrogating the implications of their choices and actions and where such behavior affects the way we are governed and the future of democracy in our country. From Grace Mutandwa’s memoirs, The Power and the Glory/.

The other day, I listened to a kombi driver chat with a female cop and perhaps like everywhere, their banter ended up touching on the coming elections.

“I hear you will be voting earlier than everyone,” the driver said. “Yes,” the cop answered not hiding the excitement of the privilege.

Then the guy complained that he wasn’t going to vote because he had failed to register after being frustrated by the long queues.

Ah yes, the queues were frustrating, the cop agreed.

I sniggered imagining the cop was relishing the moment that a few voters would mean she had her work cut out – literally.

A few voters will certainly mean cops are not kept busy manning long winding queues, but the exchange between the cop and the kombi driver was a conversation that has gained common currency in the run up to the poll, where the question “did you register” has become the favourite topic like the British asking each other about the weather!

And with the MDC-T’s estimates that more than 300,000 people in Harare failed to register, such conversations do give a picture of the magnitude of the very flawed voter registration process.

While the figure offered by the MDC-T might look wild, word on the street does point to worse if read with the disgruntlement that prevails in other parts of the country where old women of Malawian origin for example with metal ID they got before independence were told to bring their birth certificates!

It’s not funny but Zanu PF Svengalis manipulating the electoral processes imagine they will have the last laugh.