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President Mugabe yesterday set the legislative agenda for the Fourth Session of the Eighth Parliament with the august House expected to consider about 35 pieces of legislation as we report elsewhere in this edition. Some of the envisaged Bills are completely new while some Acts are to be amended to align them to the socio-economic development needs of the time.

It is a welcome development that the majority of the Bills and Acts that President Mugabe outlined yesterday have far-reaching economic ramifications. To that end, we expect parliamentarians to make it their business to robustly debate these Bills to ensure when they are passed, they leave no gaps that could create problems in the future.

The President has done his part and it is now up to the relevant ministries and Parliament to bring these to reality. It is disheartening that the President has on several occasions spelt out Bills that were expected to be tabled before Parliament during particular sessions, but only a few Bills would see light of day in the Legislature.

Cases abound where the Executive in the form of relevant ministries have not played their part in bringing Bills to Parliament, resulting in parliamentarians sometimes running out of legislative business. Of particular concern is the fact that at the official opening of the last session, President Mugabe highlighted 21 Bills that were supposed to be tabled before the august House, but only 11 were introduced.

This has resulted in the Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces having to re-introduce some of the Bills for the new session.

For instance out of the 35 pieces of legislation that the President highlighted yesterday, seven of them were supposed to have been introduced in the last session.

Some of these Bills are the Minerals Exploration and Marketing Corporation Bill, Mines and Minerals Amendment Bill, Judicial Laws Amendment Bill, the National Competitiveness Commission Bill, the Zimbabwe Investment Authority Amendment Bill, the State Procurement Amendment Bill and the Public Health Bill.

It is our firm belief that when the President outlines the legislative agenda, ministries or better still ministers, must expeditiously bring these before Parliament particularly at this moment in time where we have the new Constitution that is the supreme law of the land whose provisions supersede any other legal provision that is in conflict to the Constitution.

Out of the 21 Bills that the President highlighted at the opening of the last session, some of these Bills are still pending before Parliament despite the fact that they have been before Parliament since December last year.

A case in point being the Minerals Exploration and Marketing Corporation Bill that was gazetted on December 8, 2015.

As to who is responsible for the delay of passing such legislation, authorities know and must do something about it. It is equally important for the Legislature to make sure that when proposed legislation is brought before Parliament, they must treat it with the seriousness that it deserves.

Proposed laws that anchor the Constitution must be expeditiously attended to by the legislature to avoid creating a Constitutional lacuna. The Executive and Legislature must take it as an indictment on them when the Judiciary has to come in and pass landmark judgments that are in sync with the Constitution, but contradicted by enabling Acts that have not yet been aligned with the Constitution.

Parliament has on several occasions prematurely adjourned due to lack of quorum as some MPs walk out of the House to transact personal business to the detriment of the taxpayers.

Some MPs have not helped matters as they, sometimes waste time debating trivial issues at the expense of serious business of the House. The other reason in the delay in passage of legislation has been as a result of MPs wasting time debating

Given the extent of the legislative agenda that President Mugabe outlined yesterday, we expect ministers to bring before the House all the Bills and for MPs to attend Parliamentary sittings regularly and vigorously debate the proposed Bills.