WHEN President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government introduced the Private Voluntary Organisation (PVO) Amendment Bill in November 2021, it went out of its way trying to justify the proposed amendment saying it would help curb money-laundering and financing of terrorism.
The government even went further to say the Bill was meant to comply with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and Financial Intelligence Unit recommendations and the need to prohibit non-governmental organisations (NGOs) from dabbling in partisan politics.
However, it was not long before the mask fell off and it is now clearer that the amendments were targeted at so-called “rogue NGOs pursuing regime change”.
Although initially they didn’t want the outside world to know that this was the motive, they somehow let the cat out of the bag by castigating NGOs at every public forum, accusing some, especially Western-funded ones, of working closely with the opposition to effect regime change.
No wonder why Mnangagwa did not abandon the proposed law when Zimbabwe was removed from FAFT’s grey list in May last year.
The international body concluded that Zimbabwe was fully compliant in implementing required global anti-money laundering banking standards and that its banks were immune from being abused by those financing terrorism.
The amendments’ focus was to target NGOs that Zanu PF says dabble in politics.
They became clearer when secretary for Provincial Affairs and Devolution for Harare, Tafadzwa Muguti tried to order NGOs to submit their work plans to him. As expected, the order was shot down in court.
- New perspectives: Money laundering red flags in insurance sector
- New perspectives: Combating money laundering in real estate
- New perspectives: How Zimbabwe can effectively fight money laundering
- New perspectives: Combating money laundering and terrorist financing
Keep Reading
We are quite convinced that if the motive was to discourage all NGOs from interfering in political issues, the Friends Associates Zimbabwe (FAZ) would not have been allowed to register and operate in the country.
FAZ, a Zanu PF affiliate with Central Intelligence Organisation links has been everywhere terrorising opposition supporters and forcing them to join Zanu PF.
The group has also run Zanu PF primary elections.
But interestingly, Zanu PF has not raised concern over FAZ’s involvement in politics.
So, for Zanu PF, NGOs only dabble in politics when they are deemed to be supporting opposition parties.
It’s high time Mnangagwa treats the people of Zimbabwe with respect.
What is now regrettably obvious is that Zanu PF wants to manipulate the law, which has been awaiting presidential assent since January 2023 to manipulate the FATF recommendations as a pretext to attack civil society.
If he goes ahead and signs the Bill into law, Mnanagwa will have contravened the country’s obligations under the Charter of the United Nations and international human rights law to promote universal respect for, and observance of fundamental human rights and freedoms, such as freedom of expression, religion or belief and freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
