The highly controversial Constitutional Amendment Bill No. 3, which seeks to extend President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s term of office by an extra two years and increase the presidential term from five to seven years, has now formally entered the parliamentary process in Zimbabwe. Speaking in Parliament today, its official main... driver, Justice Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi, said all Members of Parliament would be given an opportunity to debate the Bill before it is eventually put to a vote. The Bill seeks to fundamentally alter key aspects of Zimbabwe’s governance system, including the structure of the executive, local government, and the composition of Parliament. The Bill will now be debated in Parliament and could either be passed or rejected. Those opposed to the proposed amendments within both ZANUPF and the country maintain that such far-reaching constitutional changes require a national referendum as provided for in the Constitution of Zimbabwe rather than being decided solely through Parliament. Retired military generals who met President Mnangagwa on two separate occasions say he rejected their pleas to either shelve the Bill or submit it to a referendum. According to the generals, the president dismissed their concerns by telling them, “Whoever wins, wins.” The retired generals have since declared that the Bill will never become law, setting the stage for what some fear could become a major bloody confrontation within ZANUPF between factions aligned to President Mnangagwa and Vice President General Constantino Chiwenga, involving the military. If the Bill becomes law and extends President Mnangagwa’s stay in office, it will effectively close General Chiwenga’s pathway to the presidency, deepening tensions within the ruling party over the question of succession, which in the past triggered the military coup that removed Robert Mugabe after thirty seven year in power. The battle over Constitutional Amendment Bill No. 3 is therefore not only about constitutional reform, but also about the future balance of power within Zimbabwe’s governing elite. According to Justice Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi, the vote on the Bill will not be conducted by secret ballot. Instead, Members of Parliament will vote openly, either by a show of hands or by physically moving to one side of the chamber to vote in favour and to the other side to vote against the Bill. The Zimbabwean Constitutional Court will ultimately have to decide whether the Bill should be subjected to a referendum or not. That decision is likely to have profound political and constitutional consequences. If the court rules against a referendum, it could trigger a constitutional crisis and become a flashpoint for future political struggles over the legitimacy of the constitutional amendment process and the exercise of state power. If President Mnangagwa prevails, he will become the first leader of ZANUPF not to be removed from power by the military. The party’s first leader, Reverend Ndabaningi Sithole, was removed through ZANLA military action during the liberation struggle, while its second leader, Robert Mugabe, was removed by the Zimbabwean military in November 2017. If Mnangagwa emerges triumphant from this process and serves out his political ambitions without military intervention, he will become the first leader of ZANUPF to leave or die in office without being removed by the military, breaking a pattern that has shaped the party’s leadership history for decades.show more

Hopewell Chin’ono

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