Monday, June 17, 2013

SADC Upholds July 31 Election Date In Zimbabwe

Sadc upholds July 31 poll date

Sunday, 16 June 2013 00:00
Zimbabwe Sunday Mail

Sadc has upheld the Constitutional Court judgment that harmonised elections be held by July 31 and further stressed its
principle of non-interference in domestic judicial affairs of member states.

To this end the regional bloc, that met at an extraordinary summit of heads of state and government in the Mozambican capital yesterday, appealed to President Mugabe —through Justice and Legal Affairs Minister Patrick Chinamasa — to approach the courts seeking a two-week extension to the July 31 deadline to implement any agreed reforms saying whatever the court decreed was to bind all the parties.

Since the Constitutional Court order was directed at President Mugabe, he is the only one who can approach the court seeking an extension, if need be.

Justice Minister Chinamasa, who raised concern over the facilitator’s report that contained only the statement issued by MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai in the wake of the Presidential proclamation on Thursday leaving out his address to diplomats on Thursday, said he was studying the facilitator’s report with a view to making it the basis for any application, adding that there was no guarantee as to what the Constitutional Court would say if approached, though Sadc’s position was that whatever the court said was to bind all parties going into elections.

In an interview at Maputo International Airport just before his departure for Harare, President Mugabe described the Summit outcome as a happy one for Zimbabwe.

“It is a happy outcome for Zimbabwe... the final decision was that perhaps we should appeal to the court to examine the reasons for the arguments that have been made by others for giving people a little longer time.

Our Ministry of Justice is going to do that to appeal to the court and the decision of the court then will be binding on us. But if the Court says okay go beyond July 31st by a week or two,I hope it will satisfy the others who want a little more time,,’ President Mugabe said.

He rapped the MDC formations for employing all manner of tricks in a bid to delay the polls. A two week delay would see the polls coincide with the United Nations World Tourism Organisation general assembly that Zimbabwe is co-hosting with Zambia.

“The other parties do not want elections, they are afraid of elections; they know they are going to lose and it’s a sure case that they are going to lose,’’ President Mugabe said.

“These past five years have exposed all of us and exposed us in terms of what we are. Our sense of honesty or lack of it, our purposefulness or lack of it, and naturally the serious intent with which we have to govern,’’ the President said.

Justice and Legal Affairs Minister Patrick Chinamasa said Zanu-PF would only implement what it would have agreed on.

“We can only implement that which we have agreed, we cannot implement disagreements, they are not implementable. We can only implement that which we have agreed. If we do not agree then there is nothing to implement, until we agree on a particular reform then there is nothing to reform.

If there are disagreements then it is up to the political parties to take those issues to an election so that those disagreements are part of the election manifestos of the respective parties,’’ he said. He rapped the MDC formations for making frivolous demands that they had failed to justify over the years.

“As Zanu-PF we are of course contesting the idea that there is any need for reforms whether its media reforms, whether it’s Posa, whether it’s Aippa, we are contesting and we made it clear in the summit that the MDCs are accustomed to making generalised calls for reforms.

“In particular I made a point that in 2011, July 2011 they were making these generalised calls and I specifically asked them to make their proposals specific and to table them with the forum of negotiators but up to now since 2011, no specific proposals to Posa or Aippa or to any of the pieces of legislation they complain about have been tabled for our consideration.

“As recent as last week, when the facilitation team was in the country, they again made those generalised calls for reform and for changes, again I asked them to make specific proposals but as I speak to you now, they have not done so’’ Minister Chinamasa said.

Minister Chinamasa said in 2007, the three parties in Government had collectively implemented reforms to Aippa, Posa and the Broadcasting Services Act but the MDC formations continued generalising things to mask their fear for elections.

In the litigation strategy document the MDC-T drafted with their civil society allies, Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Eric Matinenga acknowledged that all the reforms the party was calling for had been captured in the new Constitution but would continue harping on them as part of the grand strategy to subvert the Constitutional Court judgement.

Said Matinenga, “Security sector realignment could now be achieved by going through the Constitution, by going through the constitutional provisions laws to be amended can be identified,” he said.

“There is a need to go through each and every legislation to check if it complies with the constitution.”

Several recent surveys have pointed to a Zanu-PF victory in the harmonised elections with the latest opinion coming from the leading US think-tank the Council on Foreign Relations that said the prospect of Zanu-PF loss at the polls was highly unlikely.


Sadc summit kicks off

Saturday, 15 June 2013 13:41
From Caesar Zvayi in Maputo

The Sadc Extraordinary Summit has started at the Joaquim Chissano Convention Centre here. The agenda centres on reviewing the peace and security situation in the region with specific reference to Madagascar and the DRC as well as coordinating election funds for Zimbabwe. Sources privy to the developments say Sadc leaders were receptive of political developments in Zimbabwe.

All the GPA leaders are here with a meeting of minds between President Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Professor Arthur Mutambara while Prime Minister Mr Morgan Tsvangirai is in a last ditch bid to delay elections with his civil society allies from the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition lending support.

Sources say Sadc’s position is that the Constitutional Court ruling was inviolable and elections should proceed as planned.


Mutambara ‘ousted’

Sunday, 16 June 2013 00:00
Sunday Mail Reporter

Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara was yesterday “dismissed” from his position of MDC leader by the party’s national executive for concentrating on Government business at the expense of his political outfit.

The purge affected Deputy House of Assembly Speaker and party vice-president Mrs Nomalanga Khumalo who was also expelled.

Professor Mutambara, who was in Maputo, Mozambique, attending the Sadc Summit of Heads of State and Government yesterday, could not be reached for comment.

MDC national organising secretary Mr Robson Mashiri told The Sunday Mail that the decision was taken at an ad-hoc national executive meeting in Harare. The meeting, attended by party chairman Mr Joubert Mudzumwe and provincial chairpersons, among other officials, sought to discuss strategy in the run-up to the impending national elections.

Mr Mashiri said Prof Mutambara had become a “ceremonial” president who had surrendered all duties of running the party to Mr Mudzumwe while Mrs Khumalo defected to MDC-T.

“We resolved to expel everyone who failed to turn up for today’s (yesterday) national executive meeting without a reasonable apology,” he said.

“This includes our president who we have realised is now concentrating more on government business rather than focusing on party business. Mutambara has not shown interest in becoming our president at all even with the elections approaching.

“He only ran back to us when his position in Government was under threat and we have realised he does not have the party at heart. As a result, the national executive resolved that we will not be fielding a presidential candidate this election. We will seek to form a coalition with like-minded political parties.

“At the moment, we are not considering him at all as representative of the party. We will hold a special congress after the elections that will realign the party’s leadership in the wake of defections and expulsions.”

Mr Mashiri said the party’s management committee will soon approach the Professor Welshman Ncube-led MDC to form a coalition. He ruled out a similar arrangement with MDC-T.

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