By A Correspondent|The Welshman Ncube led MDC will not be holding any primary elections to decide any of its candidates senior sources within the party revealed to ZimEye.com.
“Following chaotic scenes seen at the on going ZANU PF Primary Elections the party has opted not to carry out primary elections but will use boardroom decisions to decide the candidates,” said the senior official.
The official told ZimEye.com that the party was very fortunate in that in almost all the thirty four constituencies seconded to the party there was no need to get to primary elections stage except in the Gwanda Constituency where two candidates could not reach a compromise.
“I can put it on record that all our seats did not need to go for primary elections except in Gwanda where two strong candidates could not reach a compromise and the National Standing Committee had to make a decision on who to represent the party,” said the official.
“The National Standing Committee set on Saturday and decided that former member of parliament for Gwanda Patrick Dube be given another chance to contest the election ahead of Alderman Japhet Mkwanazi who has been a councillor at the Municipality of Gwanda,” he said.
“Councillor Mkwanazi will go back to wrestle his ward while Dube will square up with radio personality Umpile Marupi who recently defeated Minister Abednico Ncube at the ZANU PF primary elections for the Gwanda seat,” said the official who preferred not to be mentioned.
The official further indicated that the party is in the process o finalising council candidates from applications that were submitted while proportional representation candidates will be seconded by the National Standing Committee.
“By next week the local government candidates will be known and similar processes will be used to determine the final candidates,” he said.
“Senatorial and Women Proportional Representation candidates will be decided by the national standing committee,” he said.
The party will be contesting in thirty four constituencies under the banner of the MDC Alliance with Nelson Chamisa as it’s presidential candidate.
Meanwhile, another opposition political party Zimbabwe First has confirmed that it is also concluding its candidates selection process in all constituencies around the country.
Party Elections Director Kesari Chibika told ZimEye.com that the party is in the process of giving aspiring candidates a chance to reach a consensus where there is more than one candidate before holding primary elections.
“So far we have covered all the provinces,” he said.
“Our process is primarily based on asking members to step forward and serve, if there is more than one person stepping forward we ask them to agree between themselves on who the best candidate is,” he said.
“If they fail to agree we will conduct primary elections . So far the process is going on smoothly and there has been no need for a primary.”
Chibika said that the party candidates are mainly university students with a mixture of experienced politicians.