Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe looks on while First Lady Amai Grace Mugabe votes. The country voted on a draft constitution on March 16, 2013., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.
The Constitution is sacred
Tuesday, 02 April 2013 01:00
Zimbabwe Herald
The GPA was signed to pave way for the inclusive Government whose brief was to foster an environment of socio-economic and political stability in readiness for fresh elections.
ONE of our proudest traditions is consistently holding elections as and when they were due.
The Constitution has been our bible since independence in 1980 which is why even at the height of sanctions-induced economic hardships in 2008 we still marshalled the little resources at our disposal to afford the people the right to choose their leaders.
The parliament that was elected on March 29, 2008 is now in the twilight of its life which is tied to the day President Mugabe was sworn in after the presidential run-off that year.
Our Constitution is very clear that parliamentary elections should be held every five years.
And even the recently gazetted draft, which is now a constitutional Bill in Parliament, is explicit in section 158(1)(a) that “a general election must be held so that polling takes place not more than 30 days before the expiry of the five-year period (of the life of Parliament) specified in section 143”.
The life of the Seventh Parliament ends at midnight on June 29 by which time a new Parliament should have been elected.
We are thus left wondering at the motives of some people who want our country to go for over four months without a legislature and hold elections around October.
We all know the executive should derive from the legislature, and we wonder from where the executive will derive since after midnight on June 29, all sitting legislators will become ordinary citizens.
This unconstitutional proposal will set a dangerous precedent that the executive can decide when to put themselves up for acceptance or rejection by the electorate when that should be a function of the Constitution.
It is ironic that the proposal comes from a section of Government that has been making the loudest noise about checking the powers of the executive.
We couldn’t agree more with NCA chairman Professor Lovemore Madhuku who equated such thinking to a “dictatorial mindset’’. And we are quite disturbed by the tinkering made to the Constitutional Bill by the Copac management committee.
The committee may claim it agreed to make the changes to the Constitutional Bill but their agreement was neither here nor there. The fact remains that the changes made are illegal. If some people can start tinkering with the Constitution now, we wonder to what lengths they would go should they hold the reins of power.
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The inclusive Government has outlived its tenure.
Its dysfunctionality has been acknowledged across the board, which is why a cohesive Government needs to be installed for nation-building.
At inception, the inclusive Government was supposed to last for two years after which the parties in Government were to go for elections using the Kariba Draft to elect a cohesive government.
The Constitution-making process that today is being used by some to justify prolonging the inclusive Government; was never the reason the GPA was signed or the inclusive Government formed.
The GPA was signed to pave way for the inclusive Government whose brief was to foster an environment of socio-economic and political stability in readiness for fresh elections.
It is high time the MDCs came out of their comfort zones and realised that they are not the last borns of political parties in Zimbabwe.
There are other fringe parties that want endorsement by the electorate.
All GPA parties need to spare a thought for the tens of thousands of Zimbabweans who were held hostage by the moratorium on by-elections and the millions suffering the depredations of a dysfunctional coalition.
It is scandalous that to this day, close to 40 constituencies do not have representation in Parliament following the death or expulsion of legislators over the past five years.
Those constituencies have had no one to represent them or take their concerns to the relevant offices.
As we countdown to the elections, let’s do so as team Zimbabwe that differs only in the modalities of safeguarding the national interest not who should safeguard it.
More so let’s be wary of dabbling in unconstitutionalism for political expediency.
Deferring elections beyond June 29 effectively removes the rug from under the feet of the three legislators who filed applications to compel President Mugabe to call by-elections for without a parliament, there can be no by-elections.
These ex-legislators deserve their day in court.
Our leaders must remember that they hold office in trust for the people and they need to regularly go back to the people for a verdict.
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