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The Zimbabwe African Peoples Union (ZAPU) has called on the goverment extend voting rights to Zimbabweans living and working in the diaspora.
Speaking to CITE in Bulwayo,the party’s national spokesperson Ndodana Moyo said that the diaspora had contrinuted immensely to the economic development through remittances and in return the government should allow them to exercise their constitutional right.
“The government wants their money but not their vote, how does it work? The Diaspora is a special component of Zimbabwe, which sends money to assist in the development of their families and Zimbabwe as a whole, so they deserve and should have a right to shape the course of this country.
Every Zimbabwean who wishes to vote and participate in the polls must do so including those in the diaspora,”he said.
Zimbabweans living abroad have been piling pressure on the government to allow them to vote but the government has mantained its stance on the issue.
Diaspora remittances to Zimbabwe reached about 2 billion U.S. dollars in 2022, the highest ever contribution made to the local economy and calls for the extension of voting rights to Zimbabweans living and working in the diaspora aregrowing louder as the 2023 General Elections draws nearer.
In 2018,President Emmerson Mnangagwa said that Zimbabweans living in the diaspora would be allowed to vote in the elections which were held that year,but the government went back on its word.
Last year Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi contradicted that commitment when he told parliament that there would be no diaspora vote. According to him, the constitution has to be amended to allow the diaspora vote.
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