Prensa. voanews.com
Zimbabwe's parliament has amended the country's constitution to empower
the president to handpick the southern African nation's top judges. Plans to
give President Robert Mugabe such power started early this year when the
then-chief justice left the bench after reaching the age of retirement. Mugabe's
ruling ZANU-PF immediately petitioned the courts to halt public interviews to
appoint the next top judge until the constitution had been changed to allow
Mugabe to choose the new jurist.
The application failed, but ZANU-PF introduced a bill proposing the
amendment to ensure the president chooses a chief justice, along with the
deputy and the head of the high court, known in Zimbabwe as the Judge
President. Priscilla Misihairabwi, an opposition member of parliament who had
campaigned against the constitutional amendment, says the move reverses what
Zimbabweans voted for in 2013.
"Why do we take away the will of the people, something that was
voted in by millions and millions of Zimbabweans?" Misihairabwi said.
"The second thing is that it goes against [the] very basic tenet of
democracy. One of the things that democracy demands is that you have to have
separation of power. You cannot create a situation where you put all the powers
in one individual. What this thing has done is the second thing to the
executive presidency. We had the executive presidency, now we have created a
bigger creature than the executive presidency."
ZANU-PF parliament member Ziyambi Ziyambi says he sees nothing wrong
with the new law that awaits Mugabe's signature. "I think it is good for
our democracy," Ziyambi said. "We discovered a lacuna [gap] in our
law, something needed to be rectified and the bill was tabled in parliament. We
did all the due processes. ... It was discovered that there were impractical
things which were within that constitution. For instance, the outgoing chief
justice will interview his successor. It is something which is not attainable.
And besides, even if you look at most jurisdictions, even in Europe, they do
not hold public interviews for the chief justice. For other judges, yes."
The opposition has criticized the amendment as a direct reversal of the
will of the people. The 2013 constitution passed by popular referendum limited
presidential powers, including removing Mugabe's ability to handpick judges. Observers
say the amendment could have implications for the 2018 elections, as the
Supreme Court would decide on who rules on any poll disputes.