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Joram Nyathi
DR Alex Magaisa has lately been doing a great job of helping clarify recent constitutional developments in the country. I am referring in particular to constitutional matters such as the recent dismissal of former VP Joice Mujuru, and the failure by the responsible authorities earlier to call for a by-election within three months after she was appointed VP in September 2013 whereupon she immediately lost her seat in Mt Darwin.

Without necessarily supporting President Mugabe, Dr Magaisa has pointed out the relevant provisions or sections of the Constitution.

This is vitally important for two reasons: that he was a technical advisor to Copac in the constitution making process, and second, because after that process he became an advisor to former prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai in the inclusive government.

Given the way politics tends to intrude into any discourse in Zimbabwe,  Dr Magaisa’s observations on Mujuru’s dismissal are more than a legal issue. They are a matter of building both trust and confidence in the administration of the law. Where the law has been violated, let this be pointed out regardless of who breaks the law, whether by commission or omission. That is why The Herald has no qualms in running such observations. It is for our own good as a nation.

However, I was less than satisfied with Dr Magaisa’s response to subsequent constitutional questions on whether it is permissible for VPs to also run ministries or why an MP should lose his constituency seat on appointment by the President to the post of VP.

On the former question, which specifically applies to newly appointed VPs, Honourable Emmerson Mnangagwa and Phelekezela Mphoko who are also ministers, Dr Magaisa merely tells us this anomaly is a constitutional matter.

“The Constitution permits it. This may not be the ideal situation but the Constitution allows it.”

On why an elected MP should lose his seat on being appointed VP, Dr Magaisa is equally flippant. He says that is what the “law demands” and the seat is lost by operation of the law and it’s all fair. He says if this were deemed undemocratic, “the only way to resolve it would be to amend the provision”.

Meanwhile, Dr Magaisa tells us an MP who doesn’t want to lose his seat should “refuse the appointment” to the Vice Presidency.

“The idea is that you cannot be a VP for the whole country and yet still be an MP for a single constituency,” he says.

Fair and fine, but I feel apart from citing the correct provisions of the Constitution, Dr Magaisa is being disingenuous and resorting to subterfuge.

This is for two reasons: the questions being raised have two aspects to them; the legal provisions and the rationale behind such provisions.

He has chosen to dwell only on the strictly legal aspects to avoid assuming the blame he and other technical advisors to Copac must take for these clumsy provisions.

It is simply awkward that a person who has been appointed by the President to be VP, a higher post, should at the same time operate as a mere cabinet minister.

Surely that can’t be settled by citing provisions of the same problematic Constitution as if it were another received document. Thus for Dr Magaisa to tells us; “This may not be the ideal situation but the Constitution allows it” is to duck the issue. We had people with proper legal training who were advising Copac on this document from as early as 2010.

He does no better on the matter of an MP losing his seat on being appointed VP. It’s not satisfactory to say the “law demands” it and thus there is nothing unfair about it. There is and the unfair thing again is the Constitution.

Dr Magaisa says the logic is that one “cannot be a VP for the whole country and yet still be an MP for a single constituency”. I don’t know whether it is the Constitution once again which informs this logic. Why is it “normal” for a Mberengwa MP who is appointed a Minister of Education “for the whole country” to retain his seat but this becomes untenable for a VP?

My learned brother says it “is fair on everyone” that an MP appointed to the post of VP should lose his/her parliamentary seat. I want to assume that this conclusion derives from his observation earlier that the MP so appointed by the President has “the option to refuse the appointment . . . The price that you pay for the appointment to the Vice Presidency is that you give up your seat in Parliament.”

But that need not be the case Sir but for a bad constitutional provision. And this is why:

It is as if that constitutional requirement were designed to test the individual MP’s loyalty between his constituents and the President. It is a singular honour for anyone to be noticed and picked out of a crowd by the President to serve as a VP and yet this same individual campaigned and convinced voters in a particular and specific constituency that he was the right person to best represent their interests, and they placed their confidence and trust in that individual by voting for him. He is the people’s choice and the whole purpose of an election is to discover and respect the will of the people.

Yet a month after the vote, the MP must either insult the President by “refusing the appointment” to the Vice Presidency or disown the people who voted for him/her, who must now repose their trust and confidence in another who comes to them declaring, “I am he”!

Sorry, I cannot discern the rationale and fairness of such a constitutional provision. I am waiting to be convinced that it is the best technical position.

Bond coins

Talking of matters of confidence and political inebriation, I want to wish our friends and colleagues at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe the best of luck with their “bond coins” project. Suddenly everyone has become an economist and analyst, not to mention prophets who have already “seen” attempts by the “evil” Zanu-PF government to bring back the Zimbabwe dollar through the back door by introducing the bond coins.

To listen to the arguments against the Zimbabwe dollar and the level of suspicion attending to these coins, a visitor from Venus would think government was trying to test a virus serum. The hostility is shocking, the amount of negative energy generated staggering. All spread by people who should be helping to turn around the economy but for their political grievance.

So for all the positive intentions and out turns around the bond coins, I won’t be surprised by a low uptake by both banks and retailers and outright rejection by consumers in general and commuter omnibus in particular. Where these were expected to relieve the inconvenience of US dollar divisibility and lead to a downward correction of prices, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that most retailers have rounded off prices upwards to the nearest dollar to obviate the need for the bond coins.

Those promoting the project have not helped matters by harping on “they can only be used in Zimbabwe”. What’s the point? Do we use coins from Europe? China? India? Tanzania or Mozambique? But all these countries use their coins and they don’t crow about them being used only locally. Why would anyone want to carry $200’s worth of coins for shopping in South Africa?