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Zvamaida Murwira
Senior Reporter
The Private Voluntary Organisations Amendment Bill will soon be heading to the President for his assent as it is currently with the Attorney General’s Office, where it is in the final stretch of clerical cleaning and formatting after passing through Parliament.
The Bill seeks to close loopholes in the law applied to non-governmental organisations, insisting that all the money they receive and spend must go through the banking system.
They will also be forbidden to support, oppose or fund particular political parties or candidates in elections.
It lays down civil penalties for receiving or moving money outside the formal banking system.
In an interview yesterday, Clerk of Parliament Mr Kennedy Chokuda said the PVO Amendment Bill was in its last lap of cleaning up by the AG’s office before it is signed into law by the President.
“The Bill is now with the Attorney General’s Office attending cleaning up any clerical and typographical issues,” he said. “Once it’s done, it we will take it to the President. We are almost done and very soon we will be gazetting it for it to become law.”
The Bill was passed by both the National Assembly and Senate with some amendments after Parliament accommodated concerns raised by several stakeholders.
Among other things, the Bill seeks to upgrade the financial accountability of NGOs, monitor funding in Zimbabwe and how funds are used.
This is largely to stop people using a PVO to launder funds, or fund terrorism, but also to ensure that a PVO was operating in the areas where it was registered, such as health or education or supporting the vulnerable and disadvantaged, or conservations issues and swathes of recreation.
One area of concern in Zimbabwe is the risk that a PVO might be used as a conduit to break the law banning foreign funding of political parties and candidates, which implies laundering the money.
Citizens can support and give money to whom they like in politics, but it needs to be their own, not passing it on from some foreigner.
The PVO Amendment Bill seeks to upgrade the existing financial controls to ensure that those who donate to a PVO are not being taken for a ride by a group of con artists.
During debate, legislators rallied behind the Bill, paying particular attention to the problem of those who use a PVO to launder money for political agendas.
In his second reading speech, Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi said Government appreciated the assistance brought by many PVOs, especially in the areas of health, education and other social services, but there were some that were dabbling in politics.
Many civil organisations while not opposing the ban on them being involved in partisan politics, and not opposed to maintaining decent accounts and using the banking system, were concerned over how this would work in practice, hence the meetings between the Government and civil society organisations to find common ground on the Bill.
The Bill provides for an annual all-stakeholder meeting for non-government organisations and the Government to discuss issues of mutual interest, maintaining the discussion culture.
Clause 11 provides additional amendments that allow for civil penalties on movement of money outside banking channels by civil society organisations.
The Bill also compels anyone applying for the registration of a PVO to provide the Registrar with particulars of any beneficial ownership and of the persons who control the organisation to ensure transparency.
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