Youth leader urges youths to take part in BVR

ZANU-PF Midlands provincial youths chairperson Cde Prosper Machando has urged youths to take advantage of the ongoing voter registration exercise to go out in their numbers to register as voters.

Cde Machando said there was low turnout of youths since the Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) exercise started, which he said was worrisome.

“The youths are not coming out in numbers to register,” he said. “We have done inner district campaigns and sensitisation workshops, but that hasn’t yielded the expected response.

“At the end of the day when we check the numbers, there won’t be any change because less than 50 youths register per day.”

Cde Machando said the youths were complaining about the slow registration process.

“When we inquired from them, they said the challenge was that the registration process is very slow,” he said. “In some centres the ZEC officials register 10 people before they switch off the machine, arguing that it should cool down.

“Many youths are impatient so they end up leaving the centre without registering as voters. We, therefore, appeal to ZEC to avail more BVR kits to improve efficiency.”

Cde Machando said youths from across the Midlands province should take advantage of the BVR blitz’s second phase to register in their numbers.

“Now that BRV blitz has entered the second phase, we are appealing to the youths in the Midlands province to come out in their numbers to register as voters,” he said. “We expect to see a change in response to this second phase.”

The second phase of BVR exercise kicked off on October 29 and is expected to end on November 13, while the third phase will start on November 16 ending on December 1.

The fourth and final phase will start on December 4 and end on December 19.