The Financial Gazette
By Njabulo Ncube, Political Editor
27 June 2009
PARTIES to the Global Political Agreement (GPA) that gave birth to the inclusive government are heading for collision over plans to have the Kariba Draft used as the working document in crafting a new constitution for Zimbabwe, The Financial Gazette can reveal.
The contentious document was crafted in September 2007 by representatives of the three main political parties in Kariba at the height of the negotiations among the protagonists to the Zimbabwe crisis.
South Africa brokered the negotiations.
ZANU-PF has in recent weeks been trying to worm its way out of a constitutional making template being advocated by the larger faction of the Movement for Demo-cratic Change (MDC) citing all sorts of reasons.
Two weeks ago a ZANU-PF Parliamentary caucus recommended that the process be deferred because of an alleged lack of funds.
ZANU-PF has since galvanised its propaganda machinery to campaign for the use of the Kariba Draft in the constitution making process, courting the ire of the MDC-T.
A stalemate, however, appears inevitable at this very early stage as the MDC-T raised the red flag this week after ZANU-PF and the Arthur Mutambara-led MDC-M endorsed the use of the Kariba Draft as the starting point to the process.
The MDC-T this week said the draft should not be used as the focal point, alleging that using the document could render the process flawed.
Tapiwa Mashakada, the MDC-T acting secretary general, said his party rejected attempts to have the Kariba Draft adopted as the “Alpha and Omega of the constitution making process”.
“We believe in a truly people-driven constitution making process where the unfettered will of the people must be reflected,” said Mashakada.
Observers said President Robert Mugabe could have influenced ZANU-PF’s position when he intimated in February that the Kariba Draft would be a departure point in the constitution making process.
In a televised birthday interview at Zimbabwe House on February 25, the President said:
“There is already a draft that the three parties agreed on; they call it the Kariba Draft because that is where they came up with the document. We shall all look at it and when we are satisfied, it shall be put to the people in a referendum. If the people say yes, then the draft will be allowed to pass through Parliament. The schedule, the time frame that was agreed on by the parties, was within 18 to 24 months, we should have a referendum. We will then have elections thereafter.”
John Nkomo, the ZANU-PF national chairman, said the MDC-T was part of the initiative that led to the drafting of the Kariba Draft and therefore cannot all of a sudden abandon the document.
He said: “They (MDC-T) participated in the negotiations at the time of the GPA and all parties agreed that it was a joint effort. We are proceeding on that basis as stipulated by the GPA. The Kariba Draft is a document born out of negotiations among the three political parties.”
But Mashakada said the Kariba Draft should not be imposed on the people but used as a reference document along with other drafts such as the one prepared by the Constitutional Commission in 2000 and another one done by the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA).
“The Kariba draft must be one of the many resource documents to lead to a people-driven constitution,” said Mashakada.
“This includes the NCA draft, the Constitutional Commission draft, among others. Why should the process be confined to one document, the Kariba Draft?” he asked.
Welshman Ncube, the secretary general of the MDC-M, said there was no way the parties could afford to ignore the Kariba Draft.
“The position is what we agreed in the GPA that we will use the Kariba Draft as the starting point to consult the people,” he said. “Remember we spent a year negotiating the Kariba Draft so that at least we have a starting point before consulting the people. It has to be used to see what is accepted or rejected. We are bound to present it to the people to either reject or accept all or certain portions of the draft,” said Ncube who also sits on the Joint Monitoring and Implementation Commit-tee.
The constitution making process began in earnest yesterday with the briefing of diplomats accredited to Harare by the Speaker of the House of Assembly Lovemore Moyo and the start of provincial consultative meetings by the Parliamentary Select Committee.
The proposed constitution is intended to replace the compromise Lancaster House Constitution that has been amended 19 times since Independence in 1980.
The crafting of the new constitution is a key component of the power-sharing deal brokered by former South African president, Thabo Mbeki, the Southern African Develop-ment Community appointed facilitator in the country’s crisis.
Under the GPA, signed by President Mugabe and the two leaders of the MDC formations in September last year, the rival parties are required to ensure that a new constitution is in place before fresh elections are conducted.
Article 6 of the agreement mandates Parliament to appoint a Select Committee on a new constitution. The Standing Rules and Orders Committee recently appointed 25 lawmakers from the House of Assembly and the Senate to spearhead the process.
The Select Committee is co-chaired by Munyaradzi Paul Mangwana (ZANU-PF), Doug-las Mwonzora (MDC-T) and David Coltart (MDC-M).
Moyo told diplomats and the consultative meeting at a local hotel yesterday that the Kariba Draft would not be shoved down the throat of the nation.
He said: “Let me assure you that the process will be people-based, people-centred, people led and therefore people driven. It is public knowledge that there are those who wish to prescribe what views Zimbabweans should have but it must be restated that the GPA speaks to the fact that it is the fundamental right and duty of the Zimbabwean people to make a constitution by themselves and for themselves”.
Moyo said Parliament was guided by the provisions outlined in the GPA.
“However, it must be noted that any individual or organisation are free to submit their preferred document to the sub-committee during the national outreach after July 13,” the Speaker said.
. . . as SADC pencils meeting on Zim
THE Southern African Develop-ment Community (SADC) has agreed to call for a meeting next month to solve Zimbabwe’s outstanding issues of the Global Political Agreement (GPA), threatening to collapse the inclusive government.
South African President, Jacob Zuma, the current SADC chair, is understood to have informed the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) secretary-general, Tendai Biti, of the meeting in informal discussions the two held on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum held in Cape Town a fortnight ago.
Tapuwa Mashakada, the acting-secretary general of the MDC-T, confirmed the proposed meeting to discuss the outstanding issues, but was not certain about the actual dates.
“What I know is that there will be another SADC meeting specifically to discuss the outstanding issues possibly in early July,” he said.
“The secretary-general has been in touch with the SADC chair and he (Biti) indicated to me that the meeting has been set for early July, 2009,” added Mashakada.
Biti was this week out of the country, drumming up financial and material support for the bankrupt coalition government that desperately needs about US$8,2 billion to turn around the economy.
The two MDC formations last month wrote to Zuma complaining bitterly about what it alleged was President Robert Mugabe and ZANU-PF’s intransigence in implementing provisions of the GPA.
The MDC-T national executive also resolved at its extraordinary meeting on Tuesday to further refer to SADC and the African Union – the guarantors of the GPA – the alleged hate language in the state media and the arbitrary arrests of its party officials.
SADC this week held a summit to discuss the political fall-out in Madagascar, but left Zimbabwe out of the agenda. — Staff Reporter.