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MARCH 2013
MARCH 2013
VOTE NO IN THE
REFERENDUM!
WHILST couched in nice-flowing language and iced with all the trappings that bourgeoisie money can manage, the Copac Constitution must be exposed for what it is. Its an elitist peace charter by the rich fronted by Zanu PF and the two MDC formations. The ISO has come up with major reasons why the COPAC product must be relegated on the Day of the Referendum, on 16th of March.
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Socialist Worker
rights are treated with less urgency than violations of civil and political rights. People`s minds are being boggled to concentrate only on political democracy at the expense of socio economic rights which elites behind the drafting process regard as inspirational goals, rhetorically useful but having few practical implications for government policy and the distribution of resources . It is therefore not surprising that the UNDP poured millions of money to ensure that the drafting team systematically neglect in the draft socio economic rights which people had demanded, with millions still lacking access to even basic shelter, food or health care. Right to strike is not expressly given leaving it subjected to some restrictive statutes which make processes of engaging in lawful strikes cumbersome if not unpractical. The constitution again does not give workers their long waited for right to a living wage .For its neoliberal nature it leaves wages and salaries to be determined at NECs from which no guarantees for living wages can ever be obtained. However, even with a good constitution as we have witnessed with BY LENIN TINASHE the massacre of Marikana workers in South Africa it will not be the solution to the unjust society. Join us in the building of a revolutionary socialist organization - for an equal society were resources are equally disturbed. BY MIKE SAMBO
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ISO delegates at the 2012 Working Peoples Constitutional Convention that rejected the draft constitution
Whilst gains have been made in relation to the inclusion of some socio-economic, gender and labour rights, a deeper look at the COPAC Draft shows that it fails to address fundamental issues of severe poverty, gender and social inequality, economic democratisation and full political democracy as shown in the 15 Reasons to Vote No attached. In an era where 85 yearold Pope Benedict XVI resigns citing advanced age, the COPAC Draft allows an 89 year old President Mugabe to potentially rule for another 10 years, until he is 99! It ensures maximum protection of private property thereby preventing the possibility of using our diamonds, platinum, gold or banks to fulfill the declared socio-economic rights of the people. Its real aim is to create a durable constitutional framework of intra-elite democracy and harmony in the face of potential huge revolts from below arising from economic crisis. Thus the COPAC Draft leaves substantially intact the iron fist of the executive imperial presidency to be used by the ruling classes to smash revolts from below as the crisis of capitalism locally and internationally worsens. To please the western capitalist masters, the
OR OVER 15 YEARS the people of Zimbabwe have demanded a new people-driven democratic constitution to replace the compromise and lop -sided 1979 Lancaster Constitution which, with convenient self-serving amendments by Zanu PF, has been the back-bone of a dictatorial and increasingly neoliberal state. They have demanded a constitution written by the people themselves in a democratic, participatory and gender-youth-disability balanced way. A constitution that ends the imperial executive presidency and guarantees democratic and accountable political governance and bread and butter socio economic rights. Thus the people rejected the 2000 Chidyausiku Draft Constitution and the Kariba Draft Constitution. However, what COPAC has delivered, two years late and to gobble over $130million, is a deeply flawed process and product. Contrary to earlier promises, the COPAC Constitution is a negotiated and elitist peace charter by the three parliamentary political parties and their western backers.
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Socialist Worker
Oscar Pritorius
South Africa is one of the most unequal societies in the world. Unemployment is higher than it was under apartheid
Unequal
South Africa is one of the most unequal societies in the world. Unemployment is higher than it was under apartheid. With the exception of the upliftment of a small black business elite and middle class, the economic divide between rich and poor remains a racial one. And the Afrikaners are still there politically much less powerful and resentful that they face more economic competition from educated blacks. Race, poverty, and violence remain an explosive cocktail. Fear of crime is endemic among white South Africans. Their suburbs boast high fences and are protected by private security forces promising Armed Response. Despite living in a closely guarded gated community, Pistorius was obsessed with guns. In this he is entirely typical. South Africa society is permeated with firearms. South African airports still have desks where passengers hand in their guns and collect them on arrival. Detective Botha was taken off the Pistorius case after it emerged he had been charged
are getting a small fraction of the publicity that surrounded the Pistorius bail hearing. All the same that hearing bears witness to the unfinished agenda of the struggle against apartheid.
BY ALEX CALLINICOS Socialist Workers Party-UK
MARCH 2013
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15. No more half-backed promises of change or the crumbs COPAC is offering just because of elections. Politicians lie to get into power but once in office they forget the people and start looting. The COPAC Constitution will cost over $130million yet the SA one cost less than $30million! Like the Lancaster one, this COPAC Constitution will become permanent and enslave us and future generations. Politicians think they own the people, who will just blindly follow them
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Newsletter Title
Why ordinary people must say No! to the COPAC Draft Constitution
Introduction The Copac Draft Constitution is a deeply flawed process and product. Here are four major reasons: (1) The draft is not democratic: it maintains the monstrous executive presidency, does not provide for free and fair elections; does not provide for the right to recall corrupt or ineffective MPs or councilors and it provides a bloated parliament gravy train for politicians; (2) it fails to provide funded socioeconomic rights for women, workers, rural farmers, informal sector workers, youths, children, and the disabled, but massively protects and rewards the rich; (3) (3) it does not provide for economic empowerment and indigenization of the countrys main resources like diamonds and platinum to fund the poors socio-economic rights; it does not provide fairness in land redistribution and will substantially reverse the gains of the land reform; (4) (4) the Copac process and referendum are not democratic and are being fast-tracked without the people being given enough time to study and understand the draft constitution. Copac Process is undemocratic Because they are afraid that their sham may be exposed, the GNU government has dubiously provided only three weeks for campaigning on the COPAC Draft Constitution and produced only 70 000 English copies of the draft constitution and 20 000 in Shona and Ndebele for a population of over 12 million. Yet the GPA provided for up to three months of public debate. The body to run the referendum , ZEC, had stated that it required two months to prepare for the referendum. In the 2010 Kenya Constitution, the people were given four months to debate the draft constitution. It has taken COPAC over four years to come up with its draft, yet it now gives people less than three weeks to understand the bulky document, which is not even available to
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the people! To insult to injury, Copac, which is supposed to be a neutral state body, is spending millions of public funds, campaigning for a YES vote, which position is clearly unconstitutional as it violates citizens rights to free and fair elections under section 23A of the Constitution as well as citizens right to freedom from discrimination on political grounds under section 23. Further under the Electoral Law, ZEC is supposed to ensure equal and fair media coverage for both positions, but this is not being done, as only the COPAC position is enjoying unlimited media coverage. From the above, it is clear that the COPAC Constitution is there to look after the interests of politicians, the rich, employers, capitalists and imperialists. On the other hand Mugabe has clearly decided to compromise on what were the main demands of the ordinary people of Zanu PF in relation to land, indigenization and economic empowerment in order to make peace with the capitalists and imperialists so that he can live his last days in peace and not face the fate of Mubarak, Gaddaffi etc.
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Newsletter Title
Copac Constitution and Women: Not yet liberation for working class women: only elite women happy!
Many women organizations are mobilsing support for the Copac Draft arguing that women have got most of the demands they wanted. It is probably true, that the most progressive and welcome aspects of the Copac Draft constitution are in relation to women, and in particular gender equality rights. This is testimony to the massive mobilization done by women, gender organizations, trade unions and social movements like DUF before and during the Copac outreach programme. However, while major advancements have been made, the ones who will benefit the most are elite and rich women, as the bread and butter demands that are crucial for the full liberation of ordinary women have been excluded. For them poverty, hunger and oppression will continue under the Copac constitution. Gender advances made Some of the good gender rights and national objectives recognized in the Copac Draft include: gender equality as a founding value and principle [ s 3 g]; binding and enforceable rights to equality and nondiscrimination, including the right of women and men to equal opportunities in political, economic, cultural and social spheres; and to affirmative action to redress past discrimination [s 56]; to confer citizenship on children [Chapter 3]; to human and bodily dignity and to personal security including protection from domestic violence including decisions concerning reproduction [s 51, 52]; to life including protection from the death penalty [ s 48]; to fair and safe labour rights and just and equitable conditions of work including a fair and reasonable wage, to equal remuneration for similar work and to fully paid maternity leave of at least three months [s 65]; to environmental rights [ s 73]; to basic health-care services, including reproductive health-care services [s 76]; to safe, clean and potable water and sufficient food [s 77]; special elaborate rights of women under Chapter 4 Part 3, including: full and equal dignity of the person with men including equal opportunities in political, economic, and social activities; the same rights as men regarding custody and guardianship of children; and that all laws, customs, traditions and cultural practices that infringe the rights of women conferred in this Constitution are void to the extent of the infringement. [ s 80]; rights to enforce the Declaration of Rights as individuals, or on behalf of a group or class of persons [s 85] and obligation of State to domesticate all international treaties it has ratified [s 34] Key national objectives included in Chap 2, include: gender balance under s 17 compelling the State to promote full gender balance in society including the State and all institutions and agencies of government at every level must take practical measures to ensure that women have access to resources, including land, on the basis of equality with men. The empowerment objective obliges the state to endeavor to facilitate empowerment measures and to take steps to ensure adequate measures are undertaken to create employment for all Zimbabweans, especially women and youths; [ s 14]; work and labour relations objectives like the State endeavoring to secure full employment; the removal of restrictions that unnecessarily inhibit or prevent people from working and otherwise engaging in gainful economic activities; vocational training; the implementation of measures such as family care that enable women to enjoy a real opportunity to work [s 24]; protection of the family,, whereby the State is to take measures for the provision of care and assistance to mothers, fathers and other family members who have charge of children and the prevention of domestic violence [ s25]; to marriage rights, including that the State is to take appropriate measures to ensure that, no marriage is entered into without the free and full consent of the intending spouses, that children are not pledged in marriage, there is equality of rights and obligations of spouses during marriage and at its dissolution, and that in the event of dissolution of a marriage whether through death or divorce, provision is made for the necessary protection of any children and spouse [s 26]; the state to take practical measures for free and compulsory basic education for children, and higher and tertiary education with measures to ensure that girls are afforded the same opportunities as boys to obtain education at all levels. [s 27]. In terms of political rights: women can now be half of Senate [s 120]; sixty seats reserved for women in the National Assembly for the first two parliaments of the COPAC Constitution [s 124]; gender balance provision in s 17 compelling State to promote full gender balance in Zimbabwe including measures and legislative measures, to ensure that both genders are equally represented in all institutions and agencies of government at every level; and women constitute at least half the membership of all Commissions and other elective and appointed governmental bodies established by or under this Constitution or an Act of Parliament; obligation to take positive measures to rectify gender discrimination and imbalances resulting from past practices; [s 17 (2) ]; that the Commissions and judiciary must have gender balance. No economic or empowerment rights for youths, women, the unemployed, farmers and informal sector. But above gains will not achieve women emancipation Most of the above are major and powerful advances for gender equality as was demanded by women and their organizations and progressive organizations and males. However, most of these advances pertain to bringing gender equality and gender balance between men and women, whilst not touching the economic class foundations that are the real causes of inequality between men and women. As long as the major wealth of society is owned and controlled by the few, mainly men, as capitalist private property, and as long as there is the patriarchal monogamous family, then real equality between men and women will remain a mirage. Whilst welcome and a necessary step forward legal equality TO NEXT PAGE
Volume 1, Issue 1
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Copac Constitution and Women: Not yet liberation for working class women: only elite women happy! CONTINUED FROM LAST PAGE
and gender balance between men and women, will mean that most women will continue to live wretched and oppressed lives as informal sector workers, contract workers, the unemployed or in the subsistent agriculture sector. Because it is documented drafted by the elites and for the elites, the COPAC Draft constitution leaves out key economic and empowerment rights that would really make the lives of ordinary women in the urban and rural areas much better, as we have seen in Venezuela. Where the COPAC Draft provides socioeconomic rights, they are subject to the availability of funds to the State but State is not equipped to fund such rights. There are no time limits for the realization of such rights. Many of the socio-economic provisions are provided as national objectives instead of basic rights, which makes their enforceability problematic. Crucially the gender balance and equality provisions do not extend to the private sector and domain, yet this has a huge impact on the rights of women. Denial of full political and citizen rights to civil servants and employees of local authorities, wherein they are prohibited from active engagement in politics by holding political office is a massive blow to womens political engagement as such sectors are the greatest employers of women in the formal sector. Also denied in the COPAC Draft are rights to abortion, social grants, or 50-50 parity in jobs, whilst girl students have been denied the right to education at tertiary and higher levels. The absence of the right to economic development, to econom empowerment, to work in he informal sector and worker-community and public ownership and control of the major wealth of society means the capitalist and male dominated private property economic foundation is left intact. And with this remains the main reason for womens oppression and exploitation together with privatized family care. Thus the women who will benefit the ost from the Copac Draft will be the tiny layer of professional, elite and rich women who can access and use the gender equality provisions provided under the Copac Draft. And it is in its massive protection of the rich, employers and the capitalist system, that this Copac Draft constitution will in effect mean most women in the rural areas, in the informal sector, or as workers or in the townships, will remain poor, oppressed and second class citizens. As long as the system of capitalism remains intact and the private property of the rich massively protected, there will be no real liberation of women, just as of ordinary male working people. This is why ordinary women, must join up with their working class male counter-parts in saying NO to the Copac Draft Constitution and accelerating the struggle against the system of capitalism, which breeds oppression and exploitation in the first place. Only socialism will provide the basis for the true liberation of all women as well as the whole of society.
To catch the reader's attention, place an interesting sentence or quote from the story here.
No free and fair elections and capitalism continues Besides not providing for the right to recall MPs and councilors, the COPAC draft does not facilitate free and fair elections. The generals, police chiefs, judges and state bureaucrats in ZEC and Registrar-General offices, who all played a key role in ensuring Mugabe remained in power despite losing the March 2008 elections, will still be in charge of the 2013 elections. Zanu PF ensured this by delaying the completion of the constitution-making process, right to the end, when elections are due. Unlike in Kenya where the constitution was completed in 2010, and elections now held under a new electoral commission, chief justice, police chief, etc, in Zimbabwe it is the same powers as before. Witness today
the increased police attacks on civic groups, confiscation of radios or even banning meetings by Tsvangirai himself. And like Lancaster Constitution, the COPAC Draft massively protects the private property of the rich, capitalists and imperialists and the capitalist system at the expense of the poor [s 71]. We must thus reject the argument that the COPAC draft represents an incremental change from Lancaster. We dont want incremental change we want and deserve real democratic change. This is why blacks rejected the 1961 Southern Rhodesia Constitution that gave blacks 15 seats in Parliament leaving the white settlers in control. And why even the 1979 Zimbabwe Rhodesia Constitution
HARINA
abortion inofanira kubvumidzwa kuitira vakadzi vakawanda vari kufa vachibvisa nhumbu nemikoto vasafe uyezve vana vasaraswe kana kushungurudzwa nekuti vanenge vazvarwa nemukadzi asina mari yekuvachengeta. Chimwe chakakosha chiri kushungurudza vakadzi vakawanda chakasiwa ne COPAC asi chisina husungo hwakasimba ndechekuti hurumende inofanira kucherechedza vanhu vanoshanda vakazvimiririra (Informal Sector) nekushayikwa kwemabasa kuripo. Munhu wese anofanira kuve nekodzero yekuita basa rinomupa raramo. Izvi tinozviona zvakatoitwa nehurumende yeMalawi iyo yakaisa mubumbiro kuti ichatora matanho ekusumudzira vanhu mukurarama mumabasa emaoko. Nyaya yema Bill of Rights akaita sekodzero yekudzidza, kurapwa, pekugara, kudya zvakaiswa asi vachibva vatora nerumwe ruoko kuti izvi zvinongoitwa kana paine mari. Mari dzriripo dzinobva muzvicherwa zvakaita sema Diamonds, goridhe saka vanofanira kutonyora kuti mari ibve ikoko pane kuti ishandiswe nevanhu vashoma.
Madzimai nevarombo vose vemunyika yeZimbabwe bumbiro reCOPAC nderevari kutonga veZanu PF, MDC-T ne MDC pamwepo nevane mari. Harisi bumburio rinoda kuchinja upenyu hwevazhinji kuti hunake asi kuti vashoma varambe vachidya naizvozvo ngatindoita VOTE NO musi wa 16 March tivaratidze kuti taramba kuramba tichingobatwa kumeso, varombo Tamuka todawo mugove wedu, hatidye marara. By Tafadzwa Sando