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Mugabe 'bending the law'
24/04/2008 14:50 - (SA)
Johannesburg - Nearly four weeks after Zimbabwe held a general election, President Robert Mugabe and his ministers are infuriating the opposition by continuing to exercise power by bending the law to their will.
Opinion may be divided over whether Mugabe is still entitled to occupy State House but his control over the electoral machinery means he is largely able to determine the flow of events.
"This government is very sophisticated. The president can stay in office until the new one takes office. Because of the recount, Mugabe can say he is entitled to stay in office," said Nicole Fritz, director of the Southern African Litigation Centre.
"It might be the case on paper, but this is an obvious deception. They delay in order to keep control."
It had been taken for granted by government and opposition that any presidential election run-off after the polls on March 29 would have to be held within three weeks, in other words by April 19 at the latest.
But with the Mugabe-appointed electoral commission still to declare the result of the presidential election and a partial recount currently under way, that date is now academic.
According to the Harare-based constitutional lawyer Lovemore Madhuku, the wording of the electoral law is vague enough to enable Mugabe to argue the clock only starts ticking when results have been announced.
Flexible interpretations
"You can interpret the law to mean 21 days after the result has been announced, so it's after the announcement of the results, when you start counting 21 days," Madhuku said.
Even though some of the cabinet's most prominent members lost seats in the joint parliamentary and presidential polls on March 29, the government remains intact.
Patrick Chinamasa is still justice minister even though he lost his seat.
Chinamasa, also constitutional affairs minister, had a predictably flexible interpretation of the law.
"You should understand that an election is not an event, it is a process.... So my own interpretation is that it's 21 days from the announcement of results," he said.
That is the kind of attitude that infuriates the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
"Mugabe and company are not supposed to be where they are after the people made their statement on the 29th of March," said MDC spokesperson Nelson Chamisa.
"They were rejected by the people of Zimbabwe but they are now creating a vacuum and want to be beneficiaries of that vacuum."
Meticulous counting process
Derek Matyszak, a researcher on Zimbabwe for the pro-democracy regional think tank Idasa, says the government's control of the nominally independent electoral commission is key to its ability to keep hold of the reins of office.
The commission has insisted the delay to results is due to its meticulous counting process but that excuse does not wash with many so long after polling.
"It requires considerable talent to suppress the scepticism which ZEC's shifting, vacillating, implausible and illegitimate excuses for the delay in releasing the presidential results evokes," said Matyszak.
"The delay by ZEC has created the anomaly of continued governance by the president and by ministers who have lost their parliament seats and thus their democratic mandate."
Fritz said there was clear evidence the commission had bowed to pressure from the government, including its decision to order a recount in nearly two dozen constituencies a fortnight after polling following complaints by Zanu-PF.
"Complaints (are meant to be) lodged within 48 hours after the vote, which was obviously not the case," she said.
'Legal process in place'
However, Madhuku, who has long campaigned for the constitution to be tightened up, acknowledged Mugabe was within his rights to carry on in power.
"The constitution says the term of office of a president lasts six years, but it can be extended for as long as there is no new president," he said.
"As long as there is a legal process in place... and so far there's nothing illegal about it ... they remain in office until a new government is elected."
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