Parliament urged to draw up realistic goals

THE Speaker of the National Assembly, Advocate Jacob Mudenda, has urged the Parliament to draw up realistic goals that will guarantee the successful design and implementation of the Institutional plan for the Ninth Parliament.

Speaking during the Institutional Strategic Plan (2018 to 2013) at a hotel in Bulawayo yesterday, Adv Mudenda said the unreached goals of the eighth Parliament must be the point of reference in the drafting of the strategic plan for the ninth parliament.

“The unfinished business in the eighth Parliament must be the point of departure in the drafting of the strategic plan for the ninth parliament. We should brutally self examine in the planning process. This behoves us to start by critically reviewing our performance in trying to achieve the strategic objectives of the Institutional Strategic Plan in the eighth parliament before crafting the Institutional Strategic Plan for the ninth parliament,” he said.

Adv Mudenda commended the eighth Parliament for successfully aligning 154 pieces of legislation to the Constitution although it had initially targeted 400 bills.

He added that the failure of the eighth Parliament to meet its goal was caused by it’s over ambitious in attempting to bring into line all the pieces of legislation to the constitution.

“The eighth Parliament successfully aligned 154 pieces of legislation to the constitution including the General Law amendment which aligned 116 Acts to the constitution. This was below the original target of 400 Bills which was drawn from the figures that were initially announced by the Executive.

“However, the Inter-Ministerial Task Force on Legislation later revised the number of Bills that required alignment from 400 to 206.

“The effect of this revision was that the eighth parliament had, in fact, aligned 74.7 percent of the laws (154) to the constitution with only 52 pieces of legislation remained outstanding. The lesson drawn from this strategic objective was that, admittedly, the eighth parliament had been over ambitious in attempting to align all the pieces of legislation to the Constitution.

“In the successor strategy we must, therefore, remain wary of performance indicators and targets over which we have limited control as Parliament,” said Adv Mudenda.

Speaking during the meeting, Clerk of Parliament Mr Kenneth Chokunda said there is need for Parliament to involve citizenry in the surrounding areas so as to increase the participatory number of publics.

“Challenges remain in the reaching out of our citizenry in the hinterland, availing bills to the public prior to the onset of public hearings to enable them to make informed contributions as well as notifying the pubic of these general hearings. We have tried reaching out except for Chikombedzi and Chikwalakwala,” he said.