I ntro d u c t i on
T
HERE are noticeable
heightened political
tensions ahead of the
2018 elections, intra
party violence, and
a sluggish economic growth causing
pressure on families and communities.
This report points out early signs of
trouble while providing a comprehensive,
balanced approach to mitigate and
manage the risk factors where possible,
that could trigger violent conflict. As
an organization ZPP is committed to
contributing towards efforts to resolve
the underlying root causes of violence.
ZPP has been collecting, documenting
information against a set of indicators
that include political, economic and
social indicators (see annexure 1). The
indicators intend to track, monitor and
record all possible signs of potential
electoral violence ahead of the 2018
elections. The indicators map and
anticipate the potential nature, scope
and scale of political violence. This is
anticipated to allow ZPP and other
stakeholders to come up with appropriate
interventions and response measures.
These indicators are based on historical
experiences of likely triggers of violence
at a considerable scale, affecting
communities or targeting certain
groups of peoples including women,
youths, farmers, farm workers, political
activists, civil society among others.
From January- August 2017, ZPP
monitors have consistently reported
with concern the increase in use of
ethnicity, hate speech, intra party
conflict, and violence, desperation of
masses with the economic situation
failure to access cash from banks. These
indicators of concern are not suggesting
that they are more important than the
other indicators being tracked, but have
been consistently reported and flagged
by ZPP monitors.