Don't trust Levy, Sata cautions Oasis Forum
Don't trust Levy, Sata cautions Oasis ForumBy Brighton Phiri
Tuesday June 26, 2007 [04:00]
THE Oasis Forum should not be comfortable with Mwanawasa's proposed Constitutional Conference, Patriotic Front (PF) president Michael Sata has warned. And Sata said it was evident that some of the parties that participated in the presidents' summit behaved like subsidiaries of MMD.
In an interview, Sata said President Mwanawasa's decision to abandon the referendum was a temporary victory for the Oasis Forum because there were serious hurdles to deal with during the government proposed process of establishing the Constitutional Conference.
"It is a temporary victory for Oasis Forum. They should not be comfortable and relaxed now that Mr. Mwanawasa has conceded to the people's rejection of the referendum," Sata said.
He cautioned the Oasis Forum that the political parties' communiqué was MMD-tailored to meet President Mwanawasa's aspirations on the constitution-making process.
"Mwanawasa was at his best and highest peak of trickery. There was no debate in that so-called party presidents' summit for someone to come up with a proposal," Sata said. "What came out of that meeting was victory for the Oasis Forum and not any of the political parties. It was evident that some of the parties who were in that meeting behaved like subsidiaries of MMD."
Sata said it would be disastrous for the country to entrust the National Assembly with powers to determine the composition, existence and functions of the proposed constitutional conference.
"We can only trust that Parliament at our own peril. Those members in that House behave like secondary school children while the Speaker behaves like the headmaster," he said. "We should be mindful of one anomaly, all the 84 MMD MPs will not debate against government's position."
He said his party would work closely with the Oasis Forum to draft a proposed constitutional conference bill before presenting it to President Mwanawasa.
"One thing we are happy about is that the referendum has died a natural death, but we don't want the bill to originate from President Mwanawasa and his government," he said. "We have no choice but to prevail on Mwanawasa. If Mr. Mwanawasa wants to play his tricks, we shall engage him in a serious battle and his fall will be disastrous."
Sata said his party would demand for increased representation of the Church on the constitutional conference because it had wider membership than any of the political parties.
He said it would be unfair for the Catholic Church, United Church in Zambia (UCZ) and Reformed Church in Zambia (RCZ) to be restricted to providing six members when they were found in remotest parts of the country where political parties did not exist.
Sata further said his party would ask for increased representation of traditional leaders.
He said there was need to scrutinise some of the non-governmental organisations in order to eliminate briefcase ones.
But in an interview after political parties agreed to pass a constitutional assembly bill that would facilitate the enactment of a new constitution on Saturday, Sata said it was good that the MMD had agreed with the mode of adopting a new constitution as preferred by many Zambians.
Sata said from the PF's point of view, they were grateful because the MMD had accepted the position which they wanted and that what remained was a legal framework to deal with the matter.
"It doesn't matter whether the name is constituent assembly or constitutional conference, it means the same," Sata said.
"So the Oasis Forum and civil society organisations, we have to meet and agree on what we should include in the terms of reference of what is going on. We will do it faster, we will go and see Levy again so that if possible we can bring it in the next Parliament sitting or a special parliamentary session be called to deal with this issue because it is a simple law.
With this one, the referendum you can ignore it, it's a dead issue. We have achieved what we came here for."
Labels: CONSTITUTIONAL CONFERENCE, OASIS FORUM, SATA
posted by MrK @ 3:32 AM
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