Zimbabwe holds historic elections

Zimbabwe held historic elections after the ouster of the long serving President Robert Mugabe in November 2017. The elections which took place on Monday 30th July, relied on technology for voter identification and results transmission. There were, however, concerns about data security on the election commission’s servers with some voters being unable to access their information. Unlike previous political seasons in the country, the Internet was not disrupted, but there is fear that the media and the Internet could be blocked due to the ongoing protests over delays in the announcement of presidential results.

The Internet is increasingly being used in African elections with countries digitising their voter registration and identification, and making use of mobile networks to transmit results from polling stations.