Mwonzora's MASTER PIECE, Mona Lisa, Copac Constitution turns out to be rubbish!

MDC-T spokesman and COPAC co-chairperson, Douglas Mwonzora, urged Zimbabweans to adopt the draft because "it limits the president to a maximum of two terms in office, while the current constitution allows the Head of State to stand for election as many times as he or she likes".

Poor, poor, Douglas Mwonzora; he has really run out of ideas and so he is digging really deep to find a valid reason why Zimbabweans should vote yes in the upcoming referendum!

This primary reason Zimbabwe was asked in the GPA agreement to implement a number of democratic reforms and to write a new DEMOCRATIC constitution was NOT because we desperately needed to limit the maximum terms the state president can save. The primary reason we needed a new constitution was to ensure the next elections will be free and fair and a true reflection of the democratic wishes of the people of Zimbabwe and not a repeat of the wanton violence of the discredited 2008 elections.

The primary question therefore one must ask is: has

a) the agreed democratic institutional reforms been implemented necessary to make all the democratic institutions like the media, Police, Judiciary, etc. independent and strong to provide the checks and balances expected of them in a functioning and healthy democracy and

b) is this Copac constitution the democratic constitution the nation expected

To deliver and guarantee free and fair elections – with a free media, free of violence; one needs a resounding YES to a) and a resounding YES in b). This is an AND GATE as contrast to an OR GATE because an unsatisfactory performance is one or both mean the intended end result – free and fair elections - will not be delivered.

It is a well-established fact no one serious would dispute that Mugabe has stubbornly refused to implement the reforms and Tsvangirai capitulated. So the answer to a) is a resounding NO.

Having capitulated or the reforms the new Copac constitution was then drafted with the clear understanding that it would not force the implementation of the reforms; Mugabe saw to it that it did not and hence ended up “dictating” the constitution.  The answer to b) is a resound NO too.

It is another well-established fact no one serious would dispute that Zimbabwe is not going to have free and fair elections this year. There is no free media and every day there reports of the political intimidation and harassment already. The violence will go into overdrive after the referendum with the yes vote safely in the bag; Zanu PF would not want to spook the people by having violence before the referendum.

When the answers to both a) and b) are a no and no and the facts on the ground confirm there will be no free and fair elections how can anyone then justify voting for anything else in the referendum other that a NO.

The need to fix the maximum terms and age a president can serve and be, have assumed greater prominence than they rightly deserve only because the nation was frustrated at the reality of having Mugabe ruling for another day more. 33 years was more than what the people could endure! But if one examined the facts one would immediate see the people would have got rid of Mugabe years ago if elections had been free and fair. In other words having failed to get rid of Mugabe through the ballot they were now ferreting for other ways because they had really lost faith in the electoral path.

Mugabe kicked out the age restriction just as he kicked out everything else he did not like in the Copac constitution. He is 89 years old and sickly accepting a maximum of another ten years in office is hardly a compromise now is it!

The overwhelming majority in Zimbabwe have had all their rights, freedoms and liberties eroded away by this Mugabe dictators; instead of being citizens we been reduced to  subjects or, for the over 30 000 murdered by the regime over the years, slaves who do not have the right to life itself. No slave would give up his/her demand to be free because they have the assurance of a new slave-master every ten years at most! If any the slave or subject was to do that then would be out of ignorance of the true value of freedom or what it means to be a citizen!  

Douglas Mwonzora is making a big song and dance about Copac having a clause setting the maximum terms of the president only because that is the best crumb one can glean from this rubbish Copac constitution! Poor, poor Douglas Mwonzora; he talked about and carried this Copac Constitution as if he was Leonardo De Vinci carrying the Mona Lisa and now it turns it to be rubbish! Poor, poor Douglas Mwonzora!