Havalume vanaMwonzora
5 March 2021
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By Mari Matutu | I am advised by someone that there is a lot of excitement in the MDC T concerning the Political Parties Finances Act addendum that was Gazetted last week by the minister of Justice.

Douglas Mwonzora
Douglas Mwonzora

The Mwonzora camp is saying there were part of the election in 2018. I am not lazy to explain this over and over again, especially when dealing with imposters. 

  1. I think Mwonzora lacks simple knowledge that right to stand for election ordinarily reside in the citizen and never ever in Political party. [s67 of Zimbabwe constitution, article 25 of Covenant on Civil and Political rights of UN, paragraph 3 of UN General Comment of 1996] . Once Mwonzora understand that right to stand for election is in a citizen and never in a political party then he will realise that MDC T never participated in 2018 election. Political parties have right to field or sponsor a candidate but never to stand for election. Now let MDC T show by way of proof of who it sponsored or who it fielded in 2018.
  2. Let me remind Mwonzora of paragraph 17 of UN General Comment which by s46 of Zimbabwe constitution we are bound to it. It reads

17. The right of persons to stand for election should not be limited unreasonably by requiring candidates to be members of parties or of specific parties. If a candidate is required to have a minimum number of supporters for nomination this requirement should be reasonable and not act as a barrier to candidacy. Without prejudice to paragraph (1) of article 5 of the Covenant, political opinion may not be used as a ground to deprive any person of the right to stand for election.  

By law the right to elect and stand for election is in citizen.  Now if MDC T state as if the candidates who stood for election and sought to stand for MDC A by way of stating it on nomination paper, were bound to belong to MDC T and could not make choice of whom to stand for beside MDC T then they are in breach of GC 25 par 17. 

If MDC T wanted to contest in 2018 election it could only do so by fielding candidates in its name or sponsor candidates in its name or logo. Period.

  • The electoral Act requires parties who wish to field candidates to do so by lodging papers from day for after Gazette of election date to two days from nomination date. If a

political party does not lodge such forms then it cannot field or sponsor candidates. If MDC T can prove it did so and the candidates sought its sponsorship with its name and symbol then it can claim right over such sponsored candidates.

  • In terms of Political Parties Finance Act any political party that get a minimum of 5% votes from total votes in General election stand a chance to get funding from government. The party then apply to minister of Justice for funding by furnishing details required for payment. This application must be lodged only before the end of financial year of the year General elections are held. The minister then respond by way of written responds.

Now MDC T must prove it got 5%and above of total vote and in particular it must state the actual figure MDC T got because every single vote counts for that purpose. It does not have legal binding and proof to say we were in Alliance agreement since GC25 par 17 has rubbished that idea of belonging to a party before nomination. Any attempt to talk of pre election agreements as formula for allocating funds is illegal.

MDC T must further prove if it ever applied for funding based on what ever % it says it got. Should it be found by bogus people that MDC T was 1/7 of what MDC A got then the question remains , “did MDC T applied in its name based on that calculation” ? If it applied , did the minister responded on their application and gave them a written response?

Musanyangadzwa nembavha machinja. Havalume