Millions of voters in the troubled Zimbabwe will have to puzzle through a blur of alliances, divisions and sub-divisions among the political parties before deciding who is really the parliamentary candidate for whom they want to vote.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), the official election administrator, has just published a list 779 candidates for the only 210 seats available in the lower house of assembly, and 197 aspirants for the 60 elected seats in the upper house, the senate, from 12 political parties and 116 independents.

The choice is narrowed by the fact that three of those parties have clear national support.

Thereafter, voters are faced with numerous candidates claiming to represent the same party, others purporting to represent the genuine faction of one of the mainstream parties but in fact using the name and symbol of a different faction, and independent candidates who are not really independent, but allied to factions of other parties.

The muddle of candidates adds to widespread concern about the elections on March 29, when, for the first time, the electorate of 5.5 million people will have to mark their Xs on four different ballot papers for presidential, house of assembly, senate and local government wards.

Church and civic groups point out that the head of ZEC, Judge George Chiweshe, has been illegally appointed by President Robert Mugabe; that he ignored legal procedures for the setting of the election date; that the boundaries of the constituencies in the elections were illegally promulgated; and, that there is evidence of comprehensive manipulation of the voters roll.

They say ZEC has carried out almost no voter education on the complicated new system, the campaign period is far too short and there is scant hope of all would-be voters being able to cast their vote in a single day.

Also standing for the presidency are former national labour leader Morgan Tsvangirai, head of the larger faction of the Movement for Democratic Change, who has been beaten by Mugabe since 2000 in the last three elections - all dismissed by independent observers as fraudulent - and former ruling party politburo member Simba Makoni, the surprise candidate denounced by Mugabe as a prostitute.

Makoni describes himself as an independent without a political party, but has asked disgruntled members of Mugabe's ruling Zanu-PF party to back him by registering themselves in the parliamentary elections, also as independents.

In eight of the constituencies for the two chambers of parliament, the ruling party appears to have registered two candidates under its name.

However, in all cases, one of the two is an angry would-be candidate fighting against the official Zanu-PF candidate imposed by the party hierarchy after its primary elections that were riddled with bribery and cheating.

The development is unprecedented in the party's history, and observers say it indicates the deep divisions regarding corruption and the state of the economy that threaten to destroy the organisation.

Tsvangirai's faction of the MDC, formally registered as MDC- Tsvangirai, also has double candidacies facing each other in 11 constituencies, the result of two new separate sub-factions that developed since the popular original party split in 2005.

Other discontented MDC-Tsvangirai candidates have had themselves listed just as MDC, to distinguish themselves from the former labour-boss faction.

Unfortunately, this is also how the other faction of the original MDC has been registered, and there are 16 constituencies where candidates representing different groups will appear on the ballot paper to be representing the same party.