By Correspondent
President Mnangagwa has publicly admitted his support for Constitutional Amendment No3 after many months of silence over the controversial amendment.
Despite attacks and accusations that he was silently engineering the passing of the law Mnangagwa had refused to be drawn to state his preference on the issue.
I am A Constitutionalist
His classic line of defence was that he was a constitutionalist and would hand over power in 2028 when his term expires.
Addressing the ZANU PF National Assembly in Harare in August 2024 Mnangagwa said he would abide by the Constitution.
“I am a constitutionalist.
“I want our party, our leadership and our people to be constitutionalists.
“We must abide by the provisions of the Constitution to the letter.
“When it is time to go, just go”, he said.
The indifference to the frenetic actions of his party to amend the constitution introducing a raft of measures that would keep him hin power until 2030, was strange.
It maintained a flicker of hope that maybe he was against the whole CAB3 project.
Coming Out
However speaking to state media editors during a recently aired interview Mnangagwa has finally revealed his true side on the issue.
“I don’t believe in individual persuasion or individuals systems where the needs of or the wishes fo an individual take the day.
Mnangagwa added that legislators, who approved the law, had done a good thing.
“At the end of the day it wasn’t an idea of an individual.
“You cannot attribute this to a particular individual or group of persons but a collective evolution of the political process,” he added.
The President’s sudden swivel to accept the ‘collective’ decision signals what his critics have argued all along.
Mnangagwa has been the one engineering the amendment and will clearly remain in power until 2030.
Or even beyond as is feared.
Opposition leader Jameson Timba says Mnangagwa’s statements have settled an important question.
“He says he expected Parliament to pass CAB3, believed it was the correct decision, freely signed it into law and carried Cabinet and Government behind it.
“This confirms that CAB3 was not an independent parliamentary initiative.
“It was a presidentially owned political project, later presented as collective wisdom”, he said.
Timba added that collective agreement among political elites can never replace the sovereign will of the people.
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