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Nqobile Bhebhe, Senior Business Reporter
THE Parliament of Zimbabwe has been urged to enact strong legislation and enhance enforcement mechanisms to help curb rampant illicit financial inflows, which are bleeding the economy.
A study by the African Development Bank and the Global Financial Integrity estimates that in the past three decades, Zimbabwe lost US$12 billion through illicit financial flows.
Addressing a capacity workshop for African Parliamentarians Network Against Corruption in Bulawayo on Friday, Transparency International Zimbabwe, executive director Mr Tafadzwa Chikumbu said it was imperative for Parliament to play an active role in curbing corruption by formulating quality laws.
“For instance, transparency laws are needed to ensure that Government policies and deals have the informed democratic consent of the population,” he said.
“Transparency is also crucial to tackle corporate tax dodging and ensure corporations pay their fair share of tax.
“Parliament must take a more active role in the current debate on BEPS and ensure that MNC practices come under increased scrutiny at national, regional and continent-wide levels,” said Mr Chikumba.
“Advocate for progressive domestic tax regimes and a policy priority of strengthening domestic resource mobilisation institutions.
“Pressure governments to establish mechanisms for automatic sharing of tax information among trading countries.”
Mr Chikumba said IFFs tend to drain scarce foreign exchange resources, reduce government tax revenues, distort consumption and investment, and promote corruption and bribery in financial institutions and other sectors of the economy.
Acting Prosecutor General, Mr Nelson Mutsonziwa acknowledged the slow pace in competing prosecuting corruption cases.
“Although prosecution of corruption matters should be completed within a short period of time, given that we now have Anti-Corruption Courts and Prosecutorial Teams, in our experience, the speed is being slowed down by the accused person’s defence, lawyers, resulting in matters shuffling between the Superior Courts and the trial Courts for quite some time,” he said.
Mr Mutsonziwa said there were eight high profile cases pending in the High Court and two in the Constitutional Court while others are awaiting rulings before the trial courts.
However, he said the introduction of special rules may assist, without infringing on the accused’s rights to provide for a procedure that will speed up the conclusion of the prosecution of corruption cases.
Speaker of Parliament, Advocate Jacob Mudenda also bemoaned the “slow pace” of the prosecution.
“Let me also hasten to say that one of the major obstructions in the fight against corruption in Zimbabwe is the slow prosecution of cases,” he said.
“In 2020, there were seven criminal convictions out of a total of 90 dockets that were sent to the National Prosecution Authority (NPA). There were also 300 cases that were submitted by Zacc to the Zimbabwe Republic Police for investigation during that same period.
“It, therefore, follows that there is an urgent need to strengthen the criminal justice system through capacity building initiatives in order to expedite the criminal justice processes.”— @nqobilebhebhe
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