Senator Misheck Marava on Question Time

Interview broadcast 27 July 2011

Lance Guma: Following the ZANU PF sponsored violent disruption of a hearing into the Human Rights Bill in Parliament on Saturday, Zaka Senator Misheck Marava who chairs the Parliamentary Thematic Committee on Human Rights is the guest on Question Time. Listeners sent in their questions in advance of the interview using Facebook, Twitter, Skype, e-mail and text messages. Senator Marava thank you for joining us on the programme.

Misheck Marava: You are welcome.

Guma: Let’s start with the work of the Parliamentary Thematic Committee on Human Rights – what is your job?

Marava: The job of the Thematic Committee on Human Rights is, amongst other things, to oversee human rights violations in the country and report to the House but it is a body that is in the Senate. We do have another body that is in the Lower House, in the House of Assembly, the Committee on Justice. The two committees, the Thematic Committee on Human Rights and the Portfolio Committee on Justice, they do similar work and hence the, our traveling together on the outreach programmes.

Guma: Okay, now we have the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission Bill; now the difference is your committee is conducting public hearings into the shaping of that Bill – is that true?

Marava: It’s very true.

Guma: Now there were violent disturbances on Saturday targeting one of your hearings in parliament - what happened?

Marava: What happened on Saturday was that Harare was the last point where we were supposed to have some hearings, consultative hearings but what happened was that too many people were bused to the venue and the venue unfortunately happened to be parliament building. By the time we arrived there were a lot of sloganeering and chanting of slogans, dancing to the party songs, it was no longer a government thing which it is supposed to be.

It was more of a party thing than a government thing so what happened was we went ahead and went into the building to start the hearings, the consultations and when we had about four hundred people, three hundred to four hundred people in the room, the room was full, they still had hundreds and hundreds outside the parliament building.

When we started the programme, we tried to start very early but some other people who did not have the spirit of the meeting said let us wait for others to come in but the room was full already. So when we waited for a few minutes, about twenty to thirty minutes, (inaudible) but when we started by a national anthem which was demanded by some other people there, then somebody, the other group shouted that one honourable member had not sang the national anthem and he was singing it with his hands folded, and something like that, you know that funny thing.

Then we tried to point out that no, the issues that we’re dealing with do not have anything to do with national anthems. He was attacked and then pulled out of the room, thrown out and then another honourable member then was attacked, two honourable members – Brian Tshuma and Honourable Kapesa. Honourable Tshuma and Honourable Kapesa were attacked; they were attacked viciously by a group of ladies and men who were chanting ZANU PF slogans, saying that we fought for this country, how dare you don’t sing the national anthem properly and all that.

But then having seen that the situation was already tense we wanted to try and call off the meeting. Then we found out that no, there were still other people who were in there, genuine people, genuine people who had come for a special purpose of contributing to this beautiful piece of legislation, so we started the meeting and when we were half way through the meeting, the police were being overawed by the public outside so they came in and to try and stop us from going on with the meeting.

I told them no we are not going to stop because here we have at least reached a calmness so we continue with the meeting. So we continued with the meeting (inaudible) contributing, and I asked the police to look after the problem outside in the streets and not in the House because in the House we had reached some calmness of some sort because we had said if they continue doing what they were doing we were going to have to stop.

So the people who wanted to contribute said no, let’s continue. So they contributed, quite a number of people contributed. Of course some of them, they were saying anything and anything that was said by a member of the public, to us it is a contribution so until we ended up closing, with a closing prayer after people had said a lot of things.

Some of the things that were said were that you should please try and come back again after you have completed all these documents into Shona vernacular and some of the people had entered in there their versions; that is roughly what happened on Saturday at the parliament buildings.

Guma: Now several of our listeners have had the opportunity to see some of the pictures of the disturbances; it does not look like the police were actively interested in putting a stop to that.

Marava: The police to my, parliament building is a stone’s throw away from the police station and the reason why police should be overawed by mobs, I’m still stunned by that, I can’t understand it but nevertheless, calm was reached at the end, but people, journalists, honourable members, they had been manhandled.

Guma: The Clerk of Parliament, Austin Zvoma is claiming he cannot comment on the disturbances because the chairman of the two committees conducting the public hearings have not made formal reports to parliament concerning the violence. What’s your reaction to him?

Marava: No he is right; he is the chief administrator of parliament and the rule is that we will only talk details of what transpired after we have reported to the Houses. And the two committees are still to meet and come out with a joint report that we’ll submit to both Houses – the Lower House and the Upper House.

Guma: Okay, via Facebook we have a question from Norman Mombeshora who says – with all due respect, what is the response of the leadership of ZANU PF to this deplorable act? Is it not clear that this was a sanctioned move by them?

Marava: No I cannot disagree with him at all because slogans and party regalia and they were being chanted openly and yet it was a public thing, everybody could see and the bussing of the people was a public thing so, but without saying much I cannot disagree with him at all but as for the feeling from ZANU PF leadership, I don’t know, I still, I’m too small to comment on that.

Guma: The consultative meeting in parliament on Saturday had to be abandoned, we are told by reports; what happens from here? Will you try to have another hearing? That’s the question that we have from Edward who sent us an email from Harare. What happens from here?

Marava: The consultative meeting was not abandoned. It was disturbed but nevertheless, it went on, it went ahead and so we were able to collect some hearings, some views of the public and until we closed but of course the disturbance was there but then we did not want to call this thing off because there were quite a number of people who wanted to contribute who then contributed.

Guma: Michael Ruva sends his question via Facebook also and says what is the MDC going to do about these disturbances apart from just condemning them? Is there anything else that you can do?

Marava: That one is another big question; the party policy is looked after by the respective party officials whom we have in our case, the spokesperson of the party, I think he can answer that one, he is Mr. Mwonzora.

Guma: Okay we’ll move onto our next question; this one comes from Makusha Mugabe, also on Facebook, he says – mine is not a question Lance, I would like to encourage the Senator not to give up pursuing a peaceful route to change in Zimbabwe. I’d also like to tell all those who are saying what is Tsvangirai going to do about it, that it is just not an issue for Tsvangirai, it requires all Zimbabweans to stand up and condemn it, and even demonstrate their condemnation with peaceful demonstrations. Senator, any thoughts on Makusha’s comment?

Marava: He cannot be, he is so right, he is so correct because we think along the same lines - that is why I did not call off the meeting. We continued with the consultative meeting although under very difficult circumstances.

Guma: Okay, the disturbances aside, under the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission Bill, ZANU PF wanted to cover the period from 2009 when the inclusive government was formed while the other two MDCs want it to begin from Independence and include the Gukurahundi massacres. What will be the point of starting in 2009?

Marava: Well the deal emanates from the minister’s office and when it came, it came with a cut-off date of 13 th February 2009 and that is one of the areas where the majority of Zimbabweans are saying no, we want to go back to a reasonably earlier period and while some are also arguing and saying no we want to look forward and what we must do now is forget the past and forge forward. That is one of the points but the majority of people are saying no, 2009 13 th February is too early.

Guma: What do you see happening then? Clearly it’s just going to be like the constitution-making exercise where you have parties with different positions and you are trying to find a negotiation; is it all going to be about what people want or what the parties then negotiate?

Marava: No I think a solution will definitely be found. We’ve got, because this emanates from Section 100R of the Amendment number 19 which brought in the unity government so because of that I’m sure that the three leaders will definitely find an answer; they cannot fail. I think it’s too small an issue for our leaders to fail to get an answer because our unity government was born of the 19 th Amendment and Section 100R that created the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission is just a section of the Amendment.

Guma: Okay, let me get this right – looking at the challenges that you’ve faced so far, there have been disturbances in Harare, Masvingo and Mutare so you haven’t been able to do much work have you?

Marava: No what happened was, we are quite open to say that there have been disturbances because definitely there have been disturbances in Harare but nevertheless we proceeded with the writing of the people’s views. There were problems in Mutare but nevertheless we proceeded with the writing of the people’s views and some have even handed in their submissions.

The only place where we did not do anything because the disturbances were too high and it was really dangerous was in Masvingo. Otherwise the Chinhoyi people submitted their versions, the Mutare people submitted their versions and they were noted. And when disturbances broke out towards the end of the programme, the job had already been done.

Guma: What happened in Masvingo? Just briefly remind our listeners.

Marava: In Masvingo, the disturbances or the hooligans who were causing disturbances were so organized so much that there were far too many, they overawed any other structure that could have wanted success including ourselves because you see let me tell you our, my team, my Thematic Committee is very much inclusive; it includes all the parties – ZANU PF, MDC-T and MDC.

We are all there in that Thematic Committee. It was a shame for one of the members of, a former member of parliament saying I cannot read, I cannot write, I cannot understand what you are saying, oh please we want the whole thing in the vernacular but presumably the presumption is that when government has gazetted they have notified the public but of course we can’t take it from the public that if they need vernacular then structures of government and party structures should do the education of their constituencies.

Guma: You feel strongly about this point; I see a few days ago you were quoted saying parliament and MPs should educate the general public on parliamentary bills because basically they just gazette and nothing is done to ensure that they are translated into indigenous languages or that the contents of the Bills are made known.

Marava: Exactly, exactly because you see what is happening now is that these visits that we are making now, these are practical, these are tangibles, they are different from theories. If the respective leaders in the constituencies are not educating their public it becomes a real problem when teams of our sort go there and want to interact with them they will not be that much capable to interact at the level that we’ll be interacting.

Guma: Our final question Senator comes from Dadirai in Budiriro. She sent us a text message wanting to know how this process will work – when you complete these hearings, what gets done?

Marava: When we have completed the hearings, we report, we write the report of course of what happened; we deliberate on them as different committees and then we will sit as joint committees, the Lower House Committee and the Upper House Committee, then we will present a joint committee to both Houses, the House of Assembly and the Senate; then the presentation of the document will be similar, it will be the same thing because it was a joint visit.

Guma: Okay then the document that you present, does the minister take it from there or in terms of actual law making, your input – how is that used?

Marava: Once we have reported to the House, then it is already, and the House will adopt the document, the report, and what will then happen it’s now for public consumption and that includes the minister’s actions on it.

Guma: Okay and then I take it, it then goes for a vote and passing into law etcetera, etcetera?

Marava: Yes because the whole exercise we are doing is to enact this Bill because before it is an Act it cannot be applied because it’s like the commissioners are already there, they were already sworn in by the president, his excellency the president on 31 st of March 2010 but these people have never worked because they don’t have the tools, and this is the tool that they are going to use, this Act, the Zimbabwe Human Rights Act; once it becomes an Act then there are practicals, then they are working. It’s like somebody who goes to cut a tree without an axe or machine to use. Right now, the commissioners are there, and a good team of commissioners who are willing to work but they cannot work because they are not yet enactioned.

Guma: Zimbabwe, that was the Zaka Senator Misheck Marava who chairs the Parliamentary Thematic Committee on Human Rights. We thank him wholeheartedly for joining us on Question Time to take questions from our listeners. Senator, thank you so much for your time.

Marava: Thank you very much, thanks, you are welcome.

To listen to the programme:

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