Thirty-six employees of civil society organisations, who were arrested on Wednesday on allegations of attempting to illegally announce results of the 2023 harmonised elections, appeared in court yesterday and were granted bail at the Harare Magistrates’ Courts.
They will be back in court next week to answer to charges of contravening the Electoral Act which prohibits the announcement of election results by anyone who is not mandated by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to do so.
In a statement earlier yesterday, National police spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi said: “The Zimbabwe Republic Police, on 23rd August 2023, arrested 36 suspects following a raid at various safe houses and hotel rooms set up by certain individuals and civic organisations, including the Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN), Election Resource Centre (ERC) and Team Pachedu, for subversive intentions.
“The arrest followed a tip-off that the said persons had set up bases and gathered equipment to use for tabulating voting statistics with the intention of unlawfully announcing election results and transmitting same to foreign country for unknown reasons.
“The coordinators of the information were hiding at Holiday Inn Hotel in Harare and were in the process of feeding information to a location in The Grange, Harare, where the Presidential Election results were to be have been announced using a VPN System through a so called “Apollo” concept.”
Asst Comm Nyathi said the fake results were to be announced on August 24, 2023 at the instigation of the opposition CCC party.
“This action was meant to pre-empt Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), which is the sole constitutionally obligated board to announce election results,” he said.
“As the Zimbabwe Republic Police, we do not regret arresting people who engage in criminal and unlawful activities but in the spirit of promoting national harmony during our election season, the State will not oppose bail.”
Zimbabweans went to vote on Wednesday in a largely peaceful environment.
There are concerns about inflammatory statements that are being made by some opposition leaders, especially meant to reject the poll result if it does not go in their favour.
A raid was conducted on Wednesday night at Holiday Inn Harare, Belgravia, Milton Park and at a property in the Grange area resulting in the arrest of the suspects.
As a result, a total of 93 smart cellphones, 38 laptops, two smart watches, two modems, one WIFI router, one external hard drive, a Nokia mobile phone handset (kambudzi), one printer, 1 X 24 port switch, various computer chargers, power back-up unit and headphones were recovered.
Police said the equipment was being used to unlawfully tabulate election voting statistics and results from polling stations throughout the country.
