Zimpapers Logo

Nick Mangwana View From The Diaspora
Those who read the Bible are familiar with a verse in Deuteronomy Chapter 27:17 which says, “Cursed is he who removes his neighbours’ landmark from its place and let all the people say, so be it.” In ancient biblical times, lands and inheritance were marked by a land as a stone or a boulder. Some can remember the use of a peg (hoko) in recent times. This distinguished where ownership began and ended. This boundary would be handed down generations and be respected. Obviously because there was no use of coordinates as is the case today there would be an expectation that one odious individual would move that peg and intrude on another person’s land.

This was clearly a fraud and one of the most abominable crimes in the community. If anyone did that, a curse would be pronounced upon them and everybody was supposed to agree with that curse. Of all the wrong things one could do, this was among the worst kind. This is a verse that finds a lot of resonance with this columnist when people are not sticking to their boundaries and keep on moving them slowly until they have taken over somebody’ territory. This scripture is supported by Proverbs 22:28 which says “Remove not the ancient landmark which thy fathers have set”.

In the last few months zanu-PF has been experiencing people that have been subverting, bending or even twisting the constitution. The holy book says cursed be they, for they are getting into territories that belong to other people. When party organs arrogates themselves power that belong to the masses who voted people into office, they are removing an ancient boundary stone and cursed be they. When they usurp power of the Congress by trying to hire and fire members of the Central Committee chosen by different districts, they are usurping power that belong to the people and that is also removing an ancient landmark, and let them all be cursed.

When scheming organs of the party are intruding into a presidential discretion of choosing an executive arm of the Central Committee called the Politburo, they are expropriating power and therefore stand accursed from removing their neighbour’s peg. In saying that, the Bible is saying that everyone should stay in their lane. Every organ of the party has a responsibility constitutionally allocated powers and responsibilities and how to exercise same. They should plough their furrows within the said boundaries. It doesn’t give anyone comfort to be cursing them for shifting the boundary but if they do, sorry, let them be accursed.

Constitutions are there in organisations to bring order and help constitute power. The zanu-PF constitution also creates institutional structures. Should anyone chooses to undermine that constitution and yet is a member of a structure then they themselves have chosen to bastardise their own structure and in raw terms they make themselves a bastard for they cannot remain legitimate when they have undermined the very instrument that founded their structure. Their power derives from the constitution and should they choose to shelve it then they might as well stand down. For where do they derive this power if not from the same instrument they have now chosen to disregard?

To make it very clear, if the constitution says that, the highest policy making organ of the party between Congresses is the Central Committee then it means any urgent and pertinent constitutional changes that need to be made in the intervening period after Congress and before the next one should be done by the Central Committee as steered by its executive arm the Politburo. Anything else is people getting out of their lane and bastardising their own structures.

To try to sneak in constitutional amendments into an Annual People’s Conference in order to change leadership which has a five year term is not only mischievous but is possibly an attempt at a coup d’état. One wonders whose interests this was meant to serve but certainly not those of the party. For how can that serve the interests of the party by destabilising it to the core? How can it be in the interests of the country as well when the ruling party is shredding itself to pieces? If everyone was to stick by and follow the constitution then the party and as a result the country would not have experienced all that confusion and nightmarish speculations and instability. It is constitutionality that presupposes predictability. Divorced from such predictability any organisation can be considered unstable because the framework which defines its lanes where people should stay in have been distorted to serve short term political expediency.

Zanu-PF constitution, like any other, is the creator and the check on power. Any power created outside it is someone moving the landmark of a neighbour’s boundary and accursed be they that do it. And to this everyone should say Amen. Any outcome not based on its own constitution more so one at variance with its provisions is a subversive, counter-revolutionary and incompatible with the ideals of the party. Now, forever Zanu-PF has always been known to be against Madhisinyongoro (anarchy and chaos) and the only way to continue to avoid that is for everyone to stay in their lane.

The 15th National People’s Conference was a great success in that it kept to its constitutional core-business. It reviewed progress in the implementation of the last Congress resolutions. It did not usurp the powers of Congress and it was incumbent on the President and First Secretary to refuse to swayed and engage in things that went against Gwara remusangano (Party Ideals and constitution). He fulfilled that role very well when he declared that those given positions with a five year tenure will have to serve their terms with no change of leadership unless or until something extra-ordinary happened. This has always been the process. Not this maelstrom of these soon to be out of fashion VONCs (Votes of No Confidence). And some people were really getting quite audacious. Organs of the party attempting to get rid of Politburo members chosen only through at the discretion of the First Secretary was not only a subversion but it was also an unconstitutional misappropriation of power and an abrogation of the said constitution. Now, that should not be allowed to happen both within the realms of the party and in the national discourse. The constitution is the boundary stone of any legitimate institution and cursed be anyone who moves that boundary stone and everyone shall say, “Amen”.

It is and should be the constitution that mediates political disputes and contestations. Due process should be adhered to. Zanu-PF has always been known to be a stickler to its own constitution until quite recently when certain events provoked questions of whether due process was being followed. It is common cause that the constitution is only set aside in a state of emergency or when circumstances are threatening a constitutional order itself. So there will be an assumption that the party was at a tipping point so extra-ordinary measures had to be used last year to deal with extra-ordinary situation should that be the case then, that should be very temporary and ephemeral. And again, anything outside that is people not staying their lane. And the stone or fence that marks the boundary is the constitution. Cursed be the person that shall remove that boundary stone.

In any vibrant political organisation there will normally be positional antagonisms. That is the source of the vibrancy. The driver of the antagonism should be ideological positions and not personalities for there is no single individual with their name in the constitution. There is just a framework and rules by which everyone should play. In saying this it means that the intra-party democracy should benefit from plurality of opinions but all that should happen within the context of a constitutional polity.

So in saying, “Pamberi negwara reMusangano” only the constitution and the ideals of the party should be animated and not individualistic opinions and not certainly not narrow self-serving interests which go contrast to mass interests.

Now that constitutional order has prevailed at the Conference in staying in one’s lane, the people pray that every party and government functionary will now go in the fast lane in implementing the policies which will bring economic recovery and tangible socio-economic benefits to the people of Zimbabwe. Those who had grown weary of power politics will surely breathe a sigh of relief.

Sometimes it is not only the wilful subversion of the constitution that matter but the wilful subversion of the founding principles of an organisation that is worse. The First Secretary and President of the Party said that, “Let’s be orderly, and let us be systematic . . .” zanu-PF is a party founded on certain principles and with a certain order. That background which includes the Liberation Struggle cannot be ignored for it is impossible to ignore.

James Madison said, “Do not separate text from background. If you do you have perverted and subverted the constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardised form of illegitimate government”. But having quoted that any organisation whilst being underpinned by its history has also to be forward looking, adaptable and transformative, all within the confines of the boundary landmark. The organisation that fails to adapt shall surely go extinct.