Vongai Masuka

South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa has said the SADC Election Observation Mission preliminary report on Zimbabwe’s elections never stated that the recently held elections were unfair, but it sighted irregularities which are usually normally on every elections held globally.

Speaking in an interview at the ongoing United Nations Genera Assembly (UNGA), Ramaphosa said the report from SADC EOM only said there were challenges with regards to the Zimbabwean harmonised elections.

“If one looks at that report, it only said that there were challenges with regard to the general elections. Many countries around the world also face these challenges during elections and the SADC never said Zimbabwean elections were unfair.

“SADC highlighted in their report that certain procedures need to be improved.” He added.

President Ramaphosa also stated that they will conduct meeting with SADC once the full report is released and will hear from Zimbabwean representatives and the observers.

“Once the report is out to the SADC body, we will then debate it and we will also hear from representatives from Zimbabwe.” He said.

His sentiments comes after the opposition party, the Citizens Coalition for  Change has used the SADC report to discredit the electoral outcomes which saw President Emmerson Mnangagwa wining with 52.6%.