FODEP’S DR. CHARITY MUSAMBA COMMENTS ON LAUNCH OF DRAFT CONSTITUTION AND NCC REPORT

The launching of the Draft Constitution by the Government yesterday signifies an important stage of the Constitution making process. More importantly, the presentation of the Draft Constitution to the public hopefully indicates the possibility of hosting the next elections under a new constitution.
However, three major issues are worthy of noting with regard to this launch;
Firstly, it is important to note that the failure by the NCC to translate the documents into the seven local languages will severely hinder genuine public scrutiny of the contents of the document and could make many ordinary people unable to make their comments on the documents. In other words, mass public participation will be undermined thereby defeating the whole spirit and purpose of ensuring effective citizen participations in the constitution making process. This shortcoming under the NCC clearly demonstrates that the process has been and continues to be driven by elites. Consequently, this will render the process not people driven.
Secondly, it is important to note that the period allocated to public scrutiny is clearly very limited. Surely, a period of forty (40) days for such an exercise will not lead to desired outcomes especially given the fact that this document has not been translated into local languages. It is of national interest that sufficient time and resources are allocated to this window left for public scrutiny. This is the only opportunity that Zambians have to give an input in the New Constitution especially taking into consideration the controversy that has surrounded the constitution making process so far. Surely, the Zambian people deserve ample time to read through, reflect and make their own independent observations, reservations and recommendations on the Draft Constitution before it is enacted.
Third, it is important to note that the modality of distributing the Draft Constitution leaves much to be desired. To begin with, it is our sincere hope that the distribution of these documents by the Offices of District Commissioner around the country would be done in non-selective and transparent manner. In addition, confining the role of distributing the draft Constitution to the DCs might have implications on public accessibility to the document. In our view, it is imperative to ensure that more distribution centres such as chiefs’ palaces, schools among other places, are put in place.
Finally, FODEP would like to encourage each and every Zambian to make an effort of accessing and analyzing the Draft Constitution. More importantly, we urge Government to find innovate ways of ensuring that the document is swiftly translated in local languages. Remember, citizen ownership is the cornerstone to the legitimacy of any Constitution in democratic Society.