Mugabe too busy to attend Sadc meetings

ZIMBABWE is not contemptuous of SADC and its facilitation team but President Robert Mugabe is too busy with pressing domestic commitments to attend meetings of the regional grouping, his spokesman said Sunday.

"President Mugabe has pressing constitutional duties to fulfil this week and will only be able to attend the special Sadc summit on Zimbabwe after ensuring that the country has put in place all the legal requirements for elections to be held by July 31, as was ordered by the Constitutional Court," said George Charamba.

He said Zimbabwe is not contemptuous of Sadc and is not resisting facilitation but is conscious that there should not be any contradiction between the Sadc-led facilitation process and the country's legal processes.

Charamba told The Sunday Mail that the President has three pressing issues to attend to this week if the country is to fulfil the requirements of the rule of law before the July 31 election deadline.

"There are pressing constitutional duties which the President has to fulfil during this very crucial week. Because of the Constitutional Court judgment, every minute, every hour, every day and every week now matters if we are to comply.

"The President was away last week attending TICAD (Tokyo International Conference on African Development) in Japan. This particular week, he has to do three critical things.

"He has to chair a Cabinet meeting during which amendments to the Electoral Act will be tabled and hopefully adopted by Cabinet. The amendments have already been digested by the Cabinet committee on legislation which draws its membership from the three political parties.

Once proposals pass this stage, it is almost a foregone conclusion that Cabinet will embrace them, but it's still a key formality that has to be fulfilled.

"Thereafter, the Minister of Justice will have to decide on the most efficacious route to take in view of the time constraints in order to make these proposals take legal effect.

"Attached to that are those legal rituals which the Minister of Justice has to fulfil to ensure adoption of the proposals," explained Charamba.

Harmonised elections are expected by July 31 this year following the ruling by the Constitutional Court.

A special Sadc summit to co-ordinate efforts to mobilise resources to finance the elections that was set for today in Maputo, Mozambique, has been postponed indefinitely.  Sadc executive secretary Dr Tomaz Salamao confirmed the postponement last week.

Added Charamba: "The second crucial thing is that the President has to chair the Politburo possibly on Wednesday at which the party (Zanu-PF) has to digest the judgment by the Constitutional Court and map the way forward.

"Whilst the general direction is clear, namely that we are moving towards full compliance with the judgment, there are certain critical details which are needed.

"I am also aware that the party will seek to finalise the rules and guidelines governing primary elections. This has become even more urgent in view of the Constitutional Court judgment.

"Thirdly, it should not be forgotten that what got one of our citizens to approach the Constitutional Court was the issue of proclamation of the election date.

"That's a key stage which the President has to fulfil somehow bearing in mind the time-line provided for under the Constitution. These are very key matters which cannot be postponed if we are to fulfil requirements of the rule of law."

The judgment by the Constitutional Court has thrown the MDC formations into disarray, as they have been lobbying that elections should be held in October and making endless and baseless claims for reforms.

What has really baffled many is that the MDC-T leader, Mr Tsvangirai, on February 12 this year boldly told a forum on human rights that elections would be held in July. This report was carried in almost all independent newspapers.

In a bid to sub-contract it's confusion, the MDC-T wants the issue about the proclamation of an election date to be a Sadc issue, but indications are that this is yet another wild goose chase by Mr Tsvangirai.

Turning to Sadc, Charamba said: "Zimbabwe is not contemptuous of Sadc nor resisting the facilitation process.

"Quite to the contrary, Zimbabwe is conscious that there should not be any contradiction between the Sadc-led facilitation process on one hand and the national laws and legal processes on the other.

"A key requirement of holding elections in Sadc or in any country for that matter is that elections must be governed by the national constitution and national laws. It is important for the President to manage all these processes to avoid needless conflict.  Whilst facilitation under Sadc proceeds by negotiation, it is not possible to negotiate with a constitution. A constitution is a set reality, it is complexly inflexible and a straitjacket to which we all must trim our behaviours in order to fit."