The Death of the Ballot: How the Proposed Constitutional Amendment Bill Dismantles Zimbabwean Democracy
Staff Writter
The Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, led by Honorable Ziyambi Ziyambi, has presented a memorandum for a Constitutional Amendment Bill that threatens to fundamentally alter the DNA of Zimbabwe’s governance.
While the government frames these changes as “modernization” and “rationalization,” a critical analysis reveals a systematic erosion of the separation of powers and a direct assault on the franchise of the Zimbabwean voter.
The most alarming provision lies in Clause 2, which seeks to repeal Section 92 of the Constitution.
By replacing the direct popular election of the President with a Parliamentary election process, the Bill effectively strips the individual citizen of their right to choose the Head of State.
This move contravenes the fundamental principle of universal suffrage.
It shifts the mandate of the Presidency from the people to political elites, creating a “managed democracy” where the executive is beholden to a legislative caucus rather than the national electorate.
Clauses 3, 7, and 8 propose extending Presidential and Parliamentary terms from five to seven years.
The Ministry justifies this as a means to ensure “policy continuity” and reduce “election-related disruption.”
In reality, this extension reduces the frequency with which the government must answer to the public. Longer terms diminish political accountability and allow the ruling elite to consolidate power without the “inconvenience” of regular public mandates, effectively insulating them from the immediate consequences of economic or social mismanagement.
The Bill proposes a fragmented and weakened electoral management system by,stripping ZEC of Delimitation Duties (Clauses 9-11),moving boundary-fixing to a separate commission often opens the door for gerrymandering.
Returning the voters’ roll to a government department—rather than an independent body raises the specter of the partisan manipulation that plagued previous decades of Zimbabwean elections.
The Amendment further seeks to tighten the Executive’s grip on other “independent” branches:
Clause 6 allows the President to appoint ten additional senators, diluting the representative nature of the upper house.
Clause 14 removes the public interview process for judges, replacing transparency with opaque executive appointments.
Clause 17 dissolves the Zimbabwe Gender Commission. By subsuming it into the Human Rights Commission, the Bill risks marginalizing gender-specific violations and diluting the focus on women’s rights in a country where gender parity remains a distant goal.
A Constitutional Regression
While the Ministry argues that these amendments “strengthen democratic structures,” the cumulative effect is the opposite. By centralizing power, extending tenures, and removing the public from the electoral process, the Bill seeks to transform the Constitution from a shield for the citizen into a sword for the state. If passed, the voter becomes a mere spectator in a governance architecture designed to sustain power rather than serve the people.
