Constitutional Amendment Bill sent to Mugabe for assent

CONSTITUTIONAL Amendment Bill (Number One) has been sent to President Mugabe for assent, according to the Government Gazette.

According to General Notice 485/2017, published in the Government Gazette, the Bill was sent to the President for his assent on August 22.

The Constitutional Bill seeks to confer on the President powers to appoint the Chief Justice, his deputy and High Court Judge President after consultation with the Judicial Service Commission. It removes the provisions in which the senior judicial officers are subjected to public interviews by the JSC.

The Bill also seeks to subordinate Labour Court and Administrative Court judges to the High Court.

In his second reading speech in the Senate, Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who also oversees the Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, said even in Britain, the Queen was involved in the appointment of the head of the judiciary while in the United States, the President does the same.

He said there was nothing untoward with what Zimbabwe was doing in amending the Constitution.

"We could have even amended it the day after its passage in 2013. It is not cast in stone," said VP Mnangagwa.

He said at the end of the day in a democracy, not everyone is expected to agree with the passage of the Bill, but the majority will always prevail.

The VP said it was critical to realise that a Con­sti­tu­tion was not cast in stone, but could be amended to suit the po­lit­i­cal, eco­nomic and so­cial in­ter­ests of the Gov­ern­ment, which is the repository of the peo­ple's will.