By Agencies
The proposed Constitutional Amendment Number 3 Bill seeks to deal with political opportunists who might try to claim presidential election victory without genuine parliamentary support, Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi has said.
Minister Ziyambi said in studies conducted so far, the direct election of a president has on many occasions triggered violence and caused severe damage to property and loss of life.
In at least 37 out of 56 Commonwealth countries, he said, presidents were elected through parliament.
“The system that we are introducing will reduce toxicity and ensure that opportunists do not wake up and say I have not lost a presidential election when, in essence, they do not even have members of parliament who would have voted for them. The amendment addresses this because, from the studies that we did, we do not have widespread violence in constituency elections.
“If you look at our history from 1990, violence around presidential elections peaked in 2008.
“Even in 2018, the post-election violence that happened in Harare was not linked to a specific parliamentary election.
“ZANU PF had won handsomely, but somebody was saying they had won the presidential election, so I am going into the street and they caused violence, and there was a loss of life and property that occurred,” Minister Ziyambi said.
He said after studying electoral processes in Botswana and South Africa, and comparing them with those in Mozambique and Tanzania, the conclusions made indicated that violence was prevalent during presidential elections compared to constituency elections.
Reports of electoral violence in the 2024 elections in Mozambique and last year’s elections in Tanzania were triggered by presidential candidates who refused to accept the official results that had been announced by the two countries’ electoral commissions.
“In Mozambique, the FRELIMO party had a two-thirds majority. Nobody spoke about it. But there was widespread violence because of the presidential elections.
“It also happened in Tanzania. It is well documented that Chama Cha Mapinduzi won handsomely, but there was a lot of violence unleashed, and people, we are told, lost their lives. Even a single life should not be lost. So when we talk of toxicity and that kind of violence, even if we are to lose one life, it should not happen.
That is why we said, why are we encumbering ourselves with a system that divides us rather than unite us?”
Proposals to the Constitutional Amendment No.3 Bill received a huge endorsement during public hearings organised by Parliament from March 30 to April 2.
