Universal adult suffrage does not mean 1 person, 1 vote for 1 person

Mbali Thethani (Journalist) SABC NEWS
Mr Biti, thank you so much, for your time this evening here on SABC News. Let's start off here and get your view. What is your reaction to this proposal that seeks to amend the electoral cycle for Zimbabwe?

Honourable Tendai Biti
Thank you Mbali, and good evening to your viewers. We regard Constitutional Amendment Number 3 of 2026 as a coup; a constitutional coup against the Republic of Zimbabwe, against the people of Zimbabwe. Remember, we had the referendum on the 21st of March 2013 that approved a new Constitution.

And that Constitution is very clear. It gives the President; first, it allows the people of Zimbabwe to choose a President of their choice. This is codified in section 91 of the Constitution (sic.).

The proposed amendment now seeks to delegate that to 300 Members of Parliament. Yet the Constitution makes it very clear, that every citizen has a right to choose a leader of his own choice or of her own choice. This is codified in section 67 of our Constitution of Zimbabwe.

And remember, our war of liberation was fought on the basis of one woman, one vote, one man, one vote. So how do 300 people replace 16 million people?

Comment
The principle of universal adult suffrage is the unqualified non-discrimination guarantee that every adult Zimbabwean citizen has an equal and unfettered vote.  The non-discrimination guarantee is enshrined in section 56(3) which provides that:

"Every person has the right not to be treated in an unfairly discriminatory manner on such grounds as their nationality, race, colour, tribe, place of birth, ethnic or social origin, language, class, religious belief, political affiliation, opinion, custom, culture, sex, gender, marital status, age, pregnancy, disability or economic or social status, or whether they were born in or out of wedlock."

As such, the principle is about who is entitled to cast the votes, and not about the voting system used to cast them. In this connection, universal adult suffrage does not mean one adult person one vote for one person; rather, it applies equally to direct elections as it does to indirect elections. In the application of the principle, it does not matter whether the system is direct (voters choose the office-holder themselves) or indirect (voters choose representatives or electors who then choose the office-holder).

While Honourable Biti is indeed correct that "the war of liberation was fought on the basis of one woman, one vote; one man, one vote"; this truth did not standalone, it was then and now inextricably linked to the "NIBMAR" principle: "No Independence Before Majority African Rule". This is why NIBMAR embodied the rallying call by African nationalists that decolonisation and the post-independence dispensation had to be democratic and majority-based, not end up as a handover to individuals.

The connection between NIBMAR and "one man, one vote" (universal adult suffrage) was direct and inseparable: "one man, one vote" was the essential democratic mechanism to make "majority rule" meaningful and enforceable. That's why "one woman, one vote; one man, one vote" was never and cannot be about voting for one person in a direct presidential election.

Hence, NIBMAR became the shorthand for rejecting independence "deals" or "settlements" that did not express the imperative of majority rule through universal adult suffrage.

NIBMAR and "one man one vote" were two expressions and aspirations of the same anti-colonial democratic principle: NIBMAR set the timing and the red line; while "one man one vote" supplied the concrete electoral machinery to make majority rule real rather than rhetorical. History has not discarded this imperative; it has deepened it!