Online Reporter
Nyore Madzianike
Senior Reporter
PARLIAMENTARIANS will from next week debate issues raised by President Mnangagwa during his State of the Nation Address and official opening of the Fourth Session of the 10th Parliament at the New Parliament Building in Mt Hampden yesterday.
This traditional debate allows Parliamentarians to bring up a wide range of issues, rather than be limited to the legislation they are considering at the time.
In his address, President Mnangagwa highlighted progress made in various sectors of the economy and set the tone for the legislative agenda during Parliament’s Fourth Session.
After the address, Parliament adjourned to next Tuesday.
Speaking after the address, lawmakers expressed gratitude to the President for his vision towards national development and confidence in the course of action he outlined.
ZANU PF Chief Whip Cde Pupurai Togarepi said he was highly motivated by the President’s address which touched on key elements of each sector and how they were progressing.
“I am highly motivated by today’s SONA. It captured almost everything. The major highlight that I picked is the progress that we are making as a country.
“The President emphasised that we are making a lot of progress in terms of development and that development needs laws to support and strengthen it.
“He also emphasised the issue of CAB3, which is now a law. That we must then align it with other laws. Other laws must be aligned to the new realities,” he said.
Cde Togarepi thanked the President for raising issues related to inclusive development.
Chairman of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Health, Mr Discent Bajila, hoped that health related Bills that will be taken to Parliament would be expedited.
“We are going to have an opportunity to debate it in the House.
“As health legislators, we note five Bills that the President mentioned, but out of those five, there are two that I think stand out, and we really, really need them as a committee.
“We have the Mental Health Bill. We are having challenges of mental health in Zimbabwe, and some of the things are quite complex to deal with, and our people still associate mental health narrowly with witchcraft.
“There is not much information out there, so we can be able to deal with mental health from a policy perspective. But also the ZNFPC (Zimbabwe National Family Planning Council) Amendment Bill, which is very important because it gives us another opportunity to have robust and honest discussions around reproductive health issues as a country,” said Mr Bajila.
The Minister of Finance, Economic Development and Investment Promotion, Professor Mthuli Ncube, was pleased with the President’s address and anticipated the country would remain in a positive territory in the financial sector.
“We are very pleased with His Excellency’s very robust speech, which covered quite a bit of what’s happening on the economic front, but also covered social issues, which are financed through the resources that we can raise from the economy, from taxes, from citizens.
“These are the issues that His Excellency addressed. Of course, in addition to that, he addressed the legislative agenda that is meant to progress our socio-economic development as we move and traverse towards 2030, Vision 2030,” he said.
Prof Ncube was happy to learn of another financial Bill which is to be tabled before Parliament in the coming months after presenting the 2027 national Budget.
He said the Bill was likely to cover how the country’s finances are gathered.
“His Excellency did mention that there’s a finance Bill, which is coming through in November and December, which will be discussed by Parliament once I present the Budget for 2027.
“The Finance Bill, naturally, will cover a lot of things which pertain to how the finances of the country are gathered, public finances, how resources are raised from the public, but also from well-wishers. All of this will be in the Finance Bill.”
Prof Ncube said the Finance Bill will be accompanied by the Appropriation Bill, which then speaks to how the budget is allocated across programmes, ministries and public sector entities.
“But also, we use the Finance Bill to strengthen other parts of our economic system in a way that gives us a robust public sector management framework.”
Heads of Government departments, parastatals, diplomats and local authorities attended the event.
