Polls preserve of Zimbabweans

Presidential, parliamentary and local government elections “must” be held.
Yet nothing could be further from the truth as there’s absolutely nothing of that sort in the GPA — or in our national laws for that matter — and this fact explains why the long overdue harmonised elections are definitely going to be held this year without fail.
This is because the proposed adoption of a new Constitution under the embattled Copac process is not a guaranteed outcome as it necessarily depends on three uncertain factors, namely, agreement on a draft Constitution by the three GPA parties, national endorsement of that agreement by the electorate in a referendum and support of that GPA agreement and national endorsement by an affirmative vote of at least two thirds majority in Parliament.
What this clearly means is that the holding of the next elections cannot rationally and legally or constitutionally be based on the uncertain adoption of the proposed Copac constitution whose outcome depends on three hurdles just mentioned above one of which would be enough to put paid to the whole Copac nonsense without stopping the holding of the elections in terms of our Constitution that has been Zimbabweanised and democratised through 19 key amendments since 1980.
Yet to what must have been an utter shock to the majority of Zimbabweans who are familiar with this background; the so-called international media — with AFP as one example that carried the offensive story — reported on Monday that the South African Minister of International Relations and Co-operation, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, speaking in her country’s Parliament in reply to an apparently planted question “dismissed a push by President Mugabe for new polls without long-delayed reforms required by the country’s unity deal”.
Nkoana-Mashabane raised eyebrows and triggered national security alarm bells when she was quoted as falsely alleging that, “the GPA envisages that an election in Zimbabwe will only be held following the finalisation of the constitution making process . . . a committee is drafting a new Constitution, after which a referendum and then elections should be held. Our (the South African) government therefore expects that there would be no deviation from the provisions of the GPA”.
It seems that just like the devil quotes the Bible for his evil ends, it has become fashionable for many in our midst to quote, in fact misquote, the GPA for purposes that are arguably designed to harm our national security and strategic interests.
Quite frankly, and this is very disappointing to note, Nkoana-Mashabane’s gross misunderstanding and shocking mischaracterisation of Zimbabwe’s constitution-making exercise as provided in the GPA is somewhere between mischievous, ignorant and treacherous and is reminiscent of the misguided anti-African Union stance that her government took in Libya and Ivory Coast. While people can make as much noise as they want about South Africa’s presumed regional or international importance, the fact is that is a misguided stance is no better than a boomerang. For the avoidance of doubt, this is not the view of the so-called Inclusive Government of Zimbabwe which is living on stolen time as its tenure has expired and it is not at all the view of Zanu-PF whose spokespersons are well known but it is considered nationalist view of this writer as a concerned citizen of Zimbabwe with public responsibilities as a Member of Parliament and it is a view that is widely shared by an overwhelming majority of Zimbabweans across the political divide who are now sick and tired of the nonsense that often comes from some of our treacherous brothers and sisters from across the Limpopo who are won’t to forget their liberation history all in a senseless and ultimately self-defeating effort to appease some marauding imperialists.
Just consider some of Nkoana-Mashabane’s startling naiveté about Zimbabwe’s constitution making process under the GPA. Her assertion that the South African government expect that “there would be no deviation from the provisions of the GPA” with regard to the Copac constitution making process is to be honest very silly because there have been very serious GPA deviations already.
For example, Article VI of the GPA provides for a very clear and specific 18 month timeline for the constitution making exercise and that timeline is now off or out or behind such that it has actually “deviated” by more than 14 months! So what does Nkoana-Mashabane mean that her government does not expect any GPA deviation when such deviations have been the order of the day?
And how about Sadc deviations on the illegal and evil Western economic sanctions whose removal is provided in the GPA? Why has the South African government failed to speak out on that and why does it appear willing to have Zimbabwe’s next elections take place without the removal of those sanctions?
More seriously and back to the main point it is instructive to elaborate on the three reasons which explain why the adoption of Copac’s proposed constitution under the GPA is conditional and therefore subject to deviations as opposed to being a guaranteed outcome. In the first place, the fact that Copac’s drafting process has drifted away from being guided by the views of the people gathered during the Copac outreach programme and contained in a national report which Copac has failed to publish, another deviation conveniently ignored by Nkoana-Mashabane, and has instead become a Lancaster-type of a negotiating exercise requiring compromise by all the three parties means that there’s a real possibility that the parties will in fact not agree on a new constitution and that would be the end of the story with no referendum or vote in Parliament. Anyone who does not understand this clear and present possibility is either a charlatan or a saboteur. There’s nothing in Article VI of the GPA which says the parties must agree at gunpoint. Nothing!
After all does Nkoana-Mashabane not know that the same three GPA parties negotiated, agreed and signed a proposed constitution called the “Kariba Draft” under the facilitation of her former President Mbeki but which did not see the light of day ahead of the March 29, 2008 harmonised elections? What that experience tells us is that even where these GPA parties agree, there’s no need to assume that their agreement will carry the day and that is how things are in the real world of politics. In the second place, Nkoana-Mashabane should surely know that even if the GPA parties end up agreeing on a new Constitution their draft would have to be put before the electorate in a referendum with an option to endorse or reject the draft. Nobody, and certainly not foreigners like Nkoana-Mashabane should be as arrogant as to prejudge the outcome of a referendum on a draft Constitution to the point of guaranteeing its adoption unless the foreigners are doing something behind the scenes which we do not know. 
Nkoana-Mashabane’s remarks on Monday betrayed her knowledge of an interfering hand in our constitution making and that is as unfortunate as it is totally unacceptable and therefore objectionable in the extreme. In the third place, and in terms of the GPA, the same Copac draft that must be agreed by the parties and endorsed by a referendum must also be supported by a two thirds majority vote in Parliament. Are we to conclude from Nkoana-Mashabane’s outburst that her government intends to arm twist our Parliament into voting for the draft when it has an option to reject it in exercise of its constitutional mandate?
Surely, even the worst malcontents in our midst, let alone Nkoana-Mashabane, must appreciate that the Copac constitution making process as provided in the GPA is not cast in stone not least because each of the hurdles requiring the parties to agree on a draft constitution, the referendum to endorse that draft and Parliament to also support it by at least two thirds majority must be overcome for the draft to be adopted. A deadlock on any of these three hurdles would be enough to put paid to the Copac process and if that happened would Nkoana-Mashabane’s South African government allege that there’s a GPA deviation?
In any event, why does Nkoana-Mashabane appear bent on misleading the world that the GPA is a binding legal document when even fools know that it is just a political agreement between only three political parties and that those part of the agreement which found expression in Constitutional Amendment Number 19, which are therefore legally binding as part of our law, have nothing to do with constitution making?
Finally, with very worrying reports that there’s a South African fellow called Hassen Ebrahim who has been squatting on Copac’s drafting process under the cover of the UNDP which typically fronts for British and American interests, what does Nkoana-Mashabane think rational Zimbabweans will conclude about her astonishing comments that there should be no GPA deviations in the drafting and adoption of Copac’s draft?
Did she say that fully knowing that there’s a South African mole deep inside our national process to make our own constitution who is seeking to influence its outcome? Is Nkoana-Mashabane not aware that Article IX of the GPA prohibits foreigners from participating in our national processes leading to the change of our constitution or change of our government? If she is, how does she explain the presence of Hassen Ebrahim, a lawyer who is a member of the ANC deep inside the drafting of our constitution? If Nkoana-Mashabane is serious against GPA deviations in the Copac constitution making, she will not find a worse GPA deviation than the presence of a South African and ANC lawyer deep inside the writing of Copac’s drafting process under the cover of the UNDP fronted by the British and Americans. The rest is history.
l Professor Jonathan Moyo is a Zanu-PF Politburo member, MP for Tsholotsho North.