New Constitution: Why the hurry?

Financial Gazette 13 August 1999

By Professor Masipula Sithole

WE seem to be a nation in a hurry, a self-imposed hurry and in that hurry we are likely to make many mistakes that could compound our many problems and find ourselves further away from appropriate so­lutions.

Although I believe that our ba­sic problems stem from a flawed constitutional framework, we should heed the saying that "a wrong  way of doing the right thing ends in wrong results".

That we are writing a new con­stitution, a "democratic" one for that matter!, is all to the good; but that, in so doing, we should be in this much of a hurry Is very absurd, to say die least

Just yesterday, the country's leadership was saying it sees "noth­ing wrong with this constitution". Then suddenly we are stampeded into coming up with a new consti­tution. Why the sudden change?

In three months we should have come up with a "draft" con­stitution after "wide consultations" with the people. As if we were that responsive to the people's needs and desires. Why die hurry so sud­denly?

There are many things one finds disturbing in this whole pro­cess.

The President started swearing in people to the constitutional com­mission in May He is still swearing them in. This is August, mind you. He has not yet finished swearing them in, while others are resign­ing and leaving the commission for one reason or the other through the commission's doors which are "still wide open", we were recently told by the Wits professor.

September is only two months from November and Judge Presi­dent Godfrey Chidyausiku is to hand in the "draft" constitution. If things continue with the present drift, it's going to be a "draft" drafted by an incomplete list of the intended commissioners, some of whom would have had no time to consult the public, let alone "as widely as possible". Even the con­sultations dialled to what the Wits professor denies is a "Constitu­tional Commission/NCA impasse" were rammed through as if there was a prize for Eddison in the end.

This thing is so stampeded that even the Judge President has had to shortcut tender laws in a hurry to meet the November deadline! How is it possible that the basic law of the land should be created by crooked means and we expect people to respect it? And leading citizens who should expose this are at the forefront of defending it is this idea of "fighting from within"? I-i-i, chimboitai.

The commis­sion does not have money for its task. This is typical of all our institutions. The country is broke. So the commis­sion joins its de­tractor, the NCA (National Consti­tutional Assembly), in looking for "donor funding" from foreign lands. We are told a delegation led by Chidyausiku himself is leaving or has just left for the United States to look for donations. But these are donations from "friendly" coun­tries/donors with "no strings at­tached", we are told. (Presumably, the NCA's donors are "unfriendly" and with "strings attached"!).

But be that as it may, this is all in an effort to come up with a "home-grown" constitution which we can truly "call our own". Two of my sons asked me for money to buy a car each. I gave them. But they have sense enough to concede me partial ownership!

What l am saying is this: If the idea is that it should be a "home­grown" constitution, the process should be "home-financed". This is possible with a little bit of hon-esty and deliberate planning. Oth­erwise, just shut up! This double and contradictory talk does not make sense at all; instead, it makes us look and feel foolish, to say the least.

It pained me to observe, the other day, how so thankful we were to the South, (not North!) Koreans for the "first" donation of "$100 000" towards the writing of our nation's "home-grown" consti­tution! Just imagine, we don't have money to write our own constitu­tion, the basic law of our land? And we call ourselves a sovereign na­tion!? Shame on us, three times!!! Couldn't we have asked "own" people to "donate", or have we alienated them that much?

But why the hurry? "Next year is an election year", we are told, as if one didn't know. "So what if it is an election year?" one might ask. "We want to hold these elections under the new constitution," goes the non-argument. When one presses further for a coherent ex­planation, tills is what you get: "We have held these elections as sched­uled every five years since indepen­dence in 1980."

One sympathises with this sen­timental nonsense to a point. But what this argument misses is the obvious fact that the argument for a new constitution "before" the election is a self-contrived one; it is a self-imposed artificial obstacle that should not make sense to "any rational human being", to use the Witts professor's favourite phrase! It's a self-imposed trap which is re­moved by simply not linking elec­tion 2000 with the writing of a new constitution.

But if time for a new "home­grown" constitution is short, is the political "playing field" level for "free" and "fair" elections? Simi­larly, I argue that there is no time left even for this minimum task that requires a national census on the basis of which the delimitation of constituencies is made before the ultimate voters' rolls upon which legitimate elections are held. And we all know, don't we, that the vot­ers' rolls are in shambles? Some­body  is apparently  not doing his job properly.

In the past, we have argued that the ZANU PF government had 110 intention whatsoever of rewrit­ing the constitution except muti­lating it with self-serving amend­ments over the 19 years.

ZANU PF just plagiarised a pro­cess in progress, a process the rul­ing party was not ready for, a pro­cess it had hardly intended, a pro­cess likely to be stopped by the people. This could be a stillborn baby no matter how many profes­sional hands are hired to the res­cue.

We need to consult the people properly and "democratically" in our attempts to come up with a "home-grown" and "democratic" constitution; we need a new elec­toral law; the voters' rolls all over the country are in "shambles".

All this requires resource mo­bilisation and planning before plunging into the field, spending money in expensive hotels. There is every doubt that we can finish even half of this before the elec­tions, even if donors were to give generously towards our "home­grown" constitutional process.

Therefore, the case for post­poning the 2000 elections is clear. We cannot continue pretending all is well, because it isn't

NB Masipula Sithole was a pro­fessor of political science at the University of Zimbabwe.

 He died in April 2003. May his soul rest in peace!!