ZIMBABWE – HARARE – The constitution-making process hit yet another snag yesterday when Parliament’s Select Committee rejected a new project document crafted by the management committee and the UNDP, and referred the deadlock to their party principals.

The Select Committee said the new proposal would “render it useless” and donors would have direct influence on the outcome of the new constitution.

Sources who attended yesterday’s Select Committee meeting said the new document provided for a project
board with three representatives of the foreign countries financing the process.

“Other members of the committee suggested that the matter be referred to the GPA principals for guidance,”
said the source.

The project document provides terms and conditions of funding the programme. Select Committee co-
chairperson Paul Munyaradzi Mangwana yesterday briefed his colleagues on the management committee-UNDP document.

Mangwana said: “I was reporting on progress made by the Zimbabwe Government and UNDP on the new project document.

“I don’t want to pre-empt the ongoing discussions by talking to the media, because there is no agreement yet. We have made some progress, but I don’t want to mess things up.”

However, Select Committee sources said the document was thrown out.”The Select Committee rejected the new document because it renders us useless. According to the GPA, we are the ones who are supposed to spearhead the writing of the new constitution but we are being sidelined.

“The new proposal is advocating for a project board that will have three foreigners sitting on it.

“This is where the bone of contention is because we are saying this is a Zimbabwean project. Why should
foreigners hijack it?” Another source said, “There was a stalemate over the new project document, which they felt was slowly but surely taking away their GPA mandate of spearheading the constitution-making process.

“The Select Committee is the legally mandated institution to deal with the constitution-making process.

“The financiers should not be anywhere near the crafting of the new constitution because our interests are
different.”Some of these financiers want to manipulate the programme and are coming through the back door.

“We as the Select committee felt our role is being bastardised by continuing to make us insignificant. If it is necessary to have that board, it should be a sub-committee of the finance committee reporting to the Select Committee, not vice versa.”

Earlier the management committee had rejected a project document signed by Constitutional Affairs Minister Eric Matinenga and UNDP.

They argued that Minister Matinenga had clandestinely appended his signature to a “flawed document,” as foreigners would have influenced the constitutional reform outcome.

The management committee subsequently met UNDP officials and came up with the document that was rejected yesterday.

On Tuesday, management committee co-chairpersons Patrick Chinamasa (Zanu-PF) and Professor Welshman Ncube (MDC) described their meeting with the UNDP as “successful”.

“The meeting was meant to review the project document and we agreed on the areas to be reviewed. There are improvements, which we agreed to which we felt would meet the expectation of the management committee and UNDP,” Cde Chinamasa said.

Prof Ncube added, “We also agreed on the way forward on how UNDP will channel funds for the programme.

“They reiterated their commitment to bankroll the programme saying they never intended to pull out.”

The UNDP pledged about US$18million for the programme last December, while the 2010 National Budget allocated US$43 million; most of it from donors.

Financial constraints and bickering over rapporteurs have delayed the constitution-making process, which is
already six months behind

By Zimnet Radio