Maravi

A disastrous ending awaits them

A disastrous ending awaits them
By Editor
Thu 25 Mar. 2010, 04:00 CAT

IT should be very clear to everyone by now that we are not going to have a constitution that truly reflects the wishes and aspirations of the Zambian people.

What we are going to have is a constitution that truly answers to the desires, designs and schemes of George Kunda and his friends. To George, it would seem that the simple majority that the MMD has in Parliament should give them the right to come up with a constitution for all the people of Zambia.

Equally, the inbuilt majority that they had created for themselves at the National Constitutional Conference should give them the mandate to do as they wish when it comes to the review of our Constitution. Decent people would not desire or wish for such a situation.

And this is what Nelson Mandela had to say on the issue of majority in matters where the constitution was concerned: “Some in the ANC were disappointed that we did not cross the two-thirds threshold, but I was not one of them. In fact I was relieved; had we won two-thirds of the vote and been able to write a constitution unfettered by input from others, people would argue that we had created an ANC constitution, not a South African constitution. I wanted a true government of national unity.”

And George should be very careful when he talks about the issue of majority because in this country we have a president who is not supported by the majority of voters, that is 50 per cent plus one. And George and his friends want to maintain this status quo, they don’t want to have a president who is elected by the majority of voters. They are happy with a president who is elected by a minority of the voters. So what majority is today tickling George?

Clearly, the concerns of George and his friends are not about the majority. They are simply about retention of power, about keeping their government jobs.

That’s all George and his friends are concerned about. Anything that assures them of that they will go with it, they will embrace it. And anything that threatens their hold on power they will oppose it, they will resist it. To George and his friends, it is their individual or personal desires that matter and not that of the collective.

This is what blinds George and his friends – the love for power and government office and the financial and other benefits it gives them. This is why they will never hesitate to trade principles on the altar of political expedience. If it helps them to keep power, they will not hesitate to go to bed with corrupt elements like Frederick Chiluba, Kashiba Bulaya and others like them.

Today George is in the forefront of denying that Chiluba is a thief. And George is doing everything to protect Chiluba from being convicted and sent to jail because he thinks, like his boss Rupiah Banda, that this will help them stay in power much longer and enjoy the benefits and privileges of holding government offices. This is all that matters to George and his friends.

George has been at the helm of the current constitution review process and bears responsibility for what is going on and what will come out of this process. George manipulated Levy Mwanawasa over this process and he has continued to do so with Rupiah. This will be George’s constitution and not the people’s constitution. This has not been a people-driven constitution but one driven by George’s ego and ambition.

And this constitution will not reflect the wishes and aspiration of the people but those of George. For George everything, including the constitution, is personal. George cannot even distinguish between the ordinary laws that Parliament every now and then enacts from the constitution.

Yes, under our Constitution, parliamentarians are the only people authorised by the Constitution to make laws. But this does not place them above the people. It is the people who are supreme, and not Parliament and that’s why the constitution, the highest law of the land, is made by the people and simply enacted by Parliament.

Of course it’s not easy for George to appreciate this, to understand the fact that the constitution must be a medium that regulates human conduct in necessary matters concerning the common good. What matters most to George is not the common good but the personal good. George does not even realise that the constitution is at the heart of the nation-building process and that people are truly free only when their constitution is people-driven.

Therefore, unless the process is correct, a constitution that is owned by the people will continue to be elusive. And central to good governance is a good constitution, one that is really owned by the people and contains all the rights of the people. This is not what George is seeking. What George is seeking is a constitution that allows them to do what Chiluba did and go scot-free. What George wants is a constitution that allows them to abuse the people and their resources and get away with it. But what the people are seeking is a constitution that stops George and his friends to lord over them; what the Zambian people are seeking is a constitution that genuinely makes political leaders servants of the electorate and not its masters.

The power to make a constitution cannot therefore be totally delegated to elected officials. This is a matter in which all the people have to, in one way or another, participate directly. But almost everything that has been done so far to this effect has been undermined and repudiated by George. The peoples’ submissions to the Mung’omba Constitution Review Commission have been ignored and replaced with those of George obtained from the discredited and manipulated National Constitutional Conference. And the whole National Constitutional Conference was simply a fraud and an abuse of public funds which George should be made to personally answer for in the future. To manipulate a constitution review process is a very serious abuse that should not be forgiven because the rock upon a democratic government rests is its constitution. The constitution is the formal statement of its fundamental obligations, limitations, procedures and institutions. The constitution of the country is the supreme law of the land, and all citizens, whatever their status, are subject to its provisions. At a minimum, the constitution establishes the authority of the government, provides guarantees for fundamental human rights and sets forth the government’s basic operating procedures.

And Jonas Shakafuswa is right when he says that people that have contrary views to what George and his friends want to do also deserve to be heard. Truly, as Shakafuswa says, “it is always better to listen to what the people say”. Those who don’t listen to what the people say because they think they are very powerful, they are in control of the state apparatus have always ended up in grief. Those who always try to rely on the state machinery to achieve their desires are bound to come to grief. Life is like a big wheel: the one who is at the top today, tomorrow is at the bottom. Clearly, George and his friends are headed for a very disastrous ending.

Labels: GEORGE KUNDA, NCC

posted by MrK @ 2:27 PM