‘Principals might assume Copac role’

meddling with the process by external forces such as embassies that are  working with the Constitution Parliamentary Select Committee (Copac), a senior Government official has said.
In an interview last week, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity, Mr George Charamba, said it was clear that Copac had within itself machinery militating against the process.
“The principals who are signatories to the Global Political Agreement (GPA) are on the verge of taking full control of the national constitution-making process. It is clear that Copac has within its own ranks forces that are militating against the entire process.
“We also realised that there are ugly fingerprints where you find political parties and foreign embassies involving themselves in the process hence we had to redeem the process away from Copac. In fact, it is bad for Copac and the management committee to take charge of the process and realign it towards a national report, which then becomes the measure of sincerity of the process,” he said.
Mr Charamba said the benchmark would be a national report.
“If people are not happy with the national report they can still reject it through a referendum, which is certainly unavoidable.
“The expedition is that this coming week Copac should be submitting the draft document for presentation to the Principals in the Inclusive Government for approval as a draft constitution,” he said.
Copac is a Committee of Parliament that was mandated to spearhead the constitution-making process in the country. It was established in April 2009. It was founded based on Article VI of the GPA which was signed on 15 September 2008. 
The new Constitution is aimed at replacing our Constitution which is a product of the Lancaster House Conference of 1979. It is widely regarded as inadequate because it has many shortcomings and has had to be amended 19 times.
It is composed of 25 members of the 7th Parliament of Zimbabwe who were selected from the three political parties to spearhead the crafting of a new Constitution.
Other structures within Copac include the Management Committee and the Steering Committee. The Management Committee comprises the negotiators of the GPA, the three co-chairpersons of the Select Committee and the Minister of Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs.
This committee provides policy direction to the constitution-making process. The Steering Committee is composed of the three co-chairpersons of the Select Committee, their three deputies and two representatives from Civil Society, namely Dr Hope Sadza and Professor Phineas Makhurane. The Steering Committee is responsible for overseeing the implementation of decisions of the Management Committee, while the Ministry of Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs is the focal point for the constitution-making process.