Patrick Chitumba Senior Reporter
THE government has printed 250,000 copies of the new constitution in English, Ndebele and Shona and work is in progress to engage experts who will translate the document into the country’s remaining 13 official languages.Responding to a question during Parliament’s question and answer session on Wednesday, the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Cde Emmerson Mnangagwa said the government was working to ensure that the constitution is available in all the country’s 16 recognised languages.

“The ministry of Justice has the responsibility to make efforts so that Zimbabweans are fully aware of the contents and substance of the new constitution,” he said.

“As a result of that we have so far produced in excess of a quarter a million copies of the new constitution in three languages, English, Shona and Ndebele. But the new constitution bids us to produce the document in all the 16 languages.

“We are recruiting experts in the other 13 languages so that we print the constitution in those other 13 languages.”

The other languages recognised in the new supreme law are Chewa, Chibarwe, Kalanga, Khoi-san, Nambya, Ndau, Shangani, Sign Language, Sotho, Tonga, Tswana, Venda and Xhosa.

Cde Mnangagwa said his ministry would start distributing copies of the constitution next month.

“As from the middle of next month, we have a programme to visit provincial capitals where we shall distribute the quantities we have in our custody to each province and all stakeholders including political parties,” he said.

“We are structuring a methodology to make sure that the pillars of society have access to the new constitution.”

The constitution is one of the milestones reached during the life of the Government of National Unity between Zanu-PF and the MDC formations that was formed in 2009 and was dissolved last year to pave way for the July 2013 polls that were won by Zanu-PF.

 

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