THEY MUST RESIGN
…Technical committee working against the people – Kasonde
By Tony Nkhoma
THE Technical Committee on amending the Constitution must resign on moral grounds because it is operating illegally, lawyer Linda Kasonde says.
Kasonde, featuring on Hot FM Radio yesterday, said the Technical Committee was operating illegally and should therefore immediately resign and abandon the illegal Bill 7 process.
The committee has begun receiving submissions from stakeholders amid allegations from many stakeholders that President Hakainde Hichilema appointed it without following the law.
“I have said when initially it was announced that this Technical Committee would be set up. I actually said that the Technical Committee members should consider resigning if indeed the terms of reference went counter to what the people of Zambia want,” she said.
Kasonde said the terms of reference of the committee were not in the best interest of the country.
“It’s not in the best interest of the people of Zambia. In order to make effective consultations that have full participation of the Zambian people, you need to allow them sufficient time to go around the country and collect those views,” she said.
Kasonde said it was evident that with the current Technical Committee, there was no permission for them to consult broadly with the public as to what they wanted to see in the Constitution.
She said it was illegal that the government was dictating to the people in terms of what they wanted to see as constitutional reforms.
“So not only does it lack transparency, it’s not democratic. It’s not participative, and it actually goes against the Constitutional Court’s judgment,” Kasonde said.
She said the current situation was a national constitutional crisis because the government did not want to obey a court order and the Speaker of the National Assembly did not want to obey the Constitutional Court.
Kasonde said the whole process of the constitutional amendment and the constituting of the Technical Committee was flawed right from the beginning.
The time frame given to the Technical Committee to do their work is impossible.
“You can’t effectively get consultation from the people in such a short period of time of 10 days. It’s ridiculous,” Kasonde said.
She wondered what magic the new technical committee was going to do to go around the country in 10 days and submit a report in one month.
“It just looks like an impossible task to do it properly. People should be allowed to come in person and present their views because the majority of our people do not have access to such facilities,” Kasonde said.
She said the committee was ambiguous because it assumed it had already collected views and was now drafting.
The terms of reference should be drafted in such a manner that allowed for people to decide what they wanted to say, as opposed to dictating to them what they needed to say.
Kasonde said what the country was currently experiencing under Hichilema and the United Party for National Development (UPND) were not signs of a healthy democracy.
