Zanu PF posters for the July 31 election have been put up on the Makoni South Constituency Parliamentary Information Centre notice board. Whilst clearly it’s tempting advertising space, surely that’s the kind of space that should advertise equally for all parties, or none. A public service. Oh, like the public broadcaster, ZBC. Right.

As Zimbabwe prepares for the 31 July election, a subscriber in Raffingora shares this unverified report of political violence in  Mashonaland West.

A Zanu PF war vet by the name Yondo has beaten a supporter of a independent candidate Mai Chombo today, 11 July at Raffingora Business Centre. She was accompanied by other war vets, whose names are Kangachepe Kufaingano and Mutokoti Vongai.

Wednesday, 10 July
In the afternoon, a stone’s throw away from a big fat 4×4 with a SADC Observer sticker on it, a woman and her two dogs browse curios for sale at a market in Newlands. Election, what election?

Thursday, 11 July
As Harare wakes up, there are some signs of life from the two main political parties as election posters start to appear on the street. But they are far outnumbered by bright yellow posters advertising a night of stand-up comedy at a local theatre. Then again maybe that’s exactly what these elections are. Kombis – the people’s taxi service – have started to mobile message the election.

At the moment, if you go onto the official Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) website, you can download a list of all the polling stations in the country, arranged by province. This would be great if the document wasn’t almost completely useless!

On opening the document, a 632-page PDF file, you find that the table (which should display where you can vote for your respective constituency) is too wide for the document, and so none of the information is lined up correctly, making all the information irrelevant. The important part (the bit about where you can vote) is all at the bottom rather than lined up with the correct constituency – it could have been a 316-page document.

Therefore, to work out where to vote you’d have to print the entire document and match up the lines of the table (not that the table is complete) or, do as I did and copy and paste the entire document (page by page) into various different programs before finally getting all the correct information in the right place. Speaking from experience, this takes 5 solid hours (not including the extra time spent trying to work out what some of the words are meant to say).

It shouldn’t be this hard to find out where to vote.

It’s going to be an interesting election!

Benefit from Emily’s copy/pasting, make your life easier, and access the spreadsheets of the polling stations as Excel files on our website. – Ed

You have to marvel at the picturesque language and the quips that have found their way into our ears as political parties hit the campaign trail.

Bloomberg wrote “Tsvangirai’s Bid to End Mugabe’s Zimbabwe Rule Fades” without showing how that bid was fading. The MDC is ‘doomed by its failure to end police support for Zanu-PF,’ said Valentia Kaseke, a security guard in Harare’s northern Emerald Hill suburb. “All they can do is wait for Mugabe to die and then Zanu-PF will be in disarray.” Turns out Tsvangirai’s bid for power is fading not because of being unpopular but because Mugabe is showing no signs of expiring any time soon!

The Daily Maverick called “Mugabe, the hot favourite” and a wise crack appeared on Twitter “literally or figuratively.”

The Herald not to be outdone by the incendiary headlining wrote: “Revolutionary party ignites star rallies” a headline that came a day after a Harare garage went up in flames with the Harare fire brigade reportedly failing to put out the fire. Next time the fire brigade must be on stand-by with plenty of water outside a Zanu PF rally in case it ignites!

Another Herald headline announced rather confidently “Zanu-PF stretches election lead.” Indeed, talk about stretching it!

Then another wise crack on Twitter: When is Mugabe hitting the campaign trail? He could always use a wheelchair to go around the country kana zvaka-presser.

Another added, “Even the Zanu PF manifesto launch was not free and fair. Once inside the venue, there was no exit until Mugabe’s speech ended.”

It’s going to be a beautiful few short weeks to 31 July.

In the past five years these two parties have worked together in an inclusive government. More plundering than job creation happened. Now that 31st of July is just three weeks away we are being promised over a million jobs and a growing economy. Going for this election both parties know that youths want jobs so its no wonder there are promises of jobs but some figures are just too good to be true. I had some time today comparing the two parties’ manifestos and here I quote some interesting hopes and dreams.

The 2013 field is set and this year it seems it’s all about JUICE for the players if they are going to score “Bhora Mugedhi”.

MDC-T highlights that,

“The MDC plan is aimed at uplifting all citizens in all corners of the country and will create 1 million jobs by 2018 and a $100 billion economy by 2040.”

27 years of one party rule so that the economy dream is fulfilled? I don’t think so.

In every match coaches battle to come up with strategies to counter opponents and since MDC-T is already attacking, not be outdone ZANU-PF is also on the offensive hoping to score  “Bhora Mugedhi” with 2,265 million jobs in the next five years.

“Creating value of US$7,3 billion from the indigenisation of 1,138 companies across 14 key sectors of the economy and over US$1,844,223,157,000 created from the idle value of empowerment assets unlocked from parastatals, local authorities, mineral rights and claims and from the State.”

There are also promises from Zanu PF for more flea and vendor market stands to be created and houses for low-income earners. And this comes along with revolutionary commitment to address and meet the goals of all Zimbabweans regardless of their social, economic, cultural or ethnic affinity, background or affiliation.

With all this on the table I wonder what strategy the merged team of MDC-N and ZAPU will have to come up with to defeat this leading pack?