‘Zanu PF negotiated in bad faith’

By The Standard | Jul. 29, 2017 | 2 Min read

CONSTITUTIONAL Amendment Number 1 Bill, passed on Tuesday in the National Assembly, proves that Zanu PF negotiated the Constitution in bad faith and exposes the opposition’s naivety, analysts have said.

BY PAIDAMOYO MUZULU

The constitutional Amendment Number 1 Bill seeks to give the President power to appoint the Chief Justice, Deputy Chief Justice and Judge President instead of going through public interviews as required by the 2013 charter.

Political analyst, Ibbo Mandaza said Zanu PF negotiated in bad faith.

“The new Constitution was more of an agreement between political parties than a genuine constitution-making exercise,” he said.

“Zanu PF negotiated in bad faith and the opposition MDCs were naïve in their approach of trusting the regime.

“MDC-T has to be answerable to the people of Zimbabwe for the support they gave to the process.”

People’s Democratic Party leader, Tendai Biti bemoaned the absence of genuine a broad-based civil society movement that could deal with constitutional issues after the demise of the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA).

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“One of our failures was to let go of the NCA,” he said.

“Now we urgently need another mass-based civil society organisation to protect and enhance our Constitution.”

Civil society organisations on Thursday issued a joint statement attacking Parliament for abrogating its role to protect the Constitution when it passed the amendment.

“We contend that the Parliament of Zimbabwe has abrogated its duty to protect the Constitution, in particular, constitutional supremacy, separation of powers, independence of the judiciary and respect of the views and aspirations of the people of Zimbabwe,” 89 organisations under the banner of the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition said.

“The Bill is meant to compromise the independence of the judiciary.

“The amendment also undermines all the current efforts to promote constitutionalism in Zimbabwe.”