Maravi

(HERALD) Mbeki summons parties

Mbeki summons parties
By Zvamaida Murwira

THE facilitator of the inter-party talks, former South African president Cde Thabo Mbeki, has scheduled a meeting of the negotiators in South Africa next week to discuss the draft Consti-tutional Amendment Number 19 Bill.

The Government’s legal department completed the draft, which was sent to Cde Mbeki for scrutiny. Cde Mbeki, in turn, called for a meeting with the negotiators in South Africa next week to study the draft. The three parties are currently studying the document.

MDC secretary-general Professor Welsh-man Ncube yesterday confirmed the negotiators had been summoned to a meeting in South Africa.

Prof Ncube and his deputy Mrs Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga are the MDC negotiators.

He said his party had since received the draft from the South African Embassy in Harare after Government dispatched the document to Cde Mbeki.

"We collected the document from the South African embassy on Tuesday. We were supposed to go to South Africa to discuss the document this week, but the facilitator told us that the MDC-T had indicated that they could not make it this week so it was deferred to next week," Prof Ncube said.

Asked if the commencement of discussions of the constitutional amendments would entail the early reconvening of Parliament, Prof Ncube said that was not necessary.

"Parliament would not convene early for purposes of debating Constitutional Amend-ment Number 19. It must first be gazetted and there should be a period of 30 days allowing public scrutiny and observations and this is a constitutional requirement that should happen before it is tabled," said Prof Ncube.

MDC-T spokesman Mr Nelson Chamisa said his party had not seen the draft Bill, but was aware that it had been sent to the facilitator.

"We have done our own draft which is now ready for scrutiny. We have not seen that Zanu-PF draft, but we understand that it is in South Africa. We hope that our document would be similar to the Zanu-PF document. Our draft has tried to capture the spirit of the Memorandum of Understanding," Mr Chamisa said.

Minister of Information and Publicity Cde Sikhanyiso Ndlovu on Tuesday told church leaders in Harare that the draft was complete and had since been forwarded to Cde Mbeki.

He said the Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs — who will be drawn from MDC-T — would steer the Bill in Parliament through all the four stages.
The MDC-T was allocated the Legal and Constitutional Affairs portfolio when President Mugabe gazetted ministries recently.

The Bill requires a two-thirds majority vote, in both Houses sitting separately, to become law.

If passed into law, the resultant Act would give legal force to the offices of Prime Minister and his two deputies and also create positions for nine non-constituency Senators.
Cde Ndlovu said he expected all the parties to support the Bill.

Zanu-PF will be represented by the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Cde Patrick Chinamasa; and the Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, Cde Nicholas Goche; while the MDC-T negotiators are party secretary-general Mr Tendai Biti and deputy national treasurer Mr Elton Mangoma.

Labels: NEGOTIATIONS, THABO MBEKI

posted by MrK @ 10:58 AM