MPs must enter Parly on merit

EDITOR — In an article that appeared in one of the daily newspapers last week, women parliamentarians were demanding that the proposed amendments to the Electoral Act include clauses that create constituencies that are exclusively for women so that it becomes compulsory that at least 50 percent of parliamentarians are women.

Why is it that these women want seats on a silver platter? Is this not the age of equality? Is it not meritocracy as opposed to sexism that drives development?

I remember women parliamentarians that were elected on proportional representation complaining that their counterparts elected in Parliament called them baccosi, I do not think progressive women like to be classified like that.

Women should get seats that they deserve because the electorate believes they can deliver even better than their male counterparts. It’s all about meritocracy and the electorate are the judges.

Section 124 1(b) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No.20) created the additional seats women members elected under the party list system of proportional representation based on the votes cast for candidates representing political parties in a general election for constituency members in the province.

The demand by women parliamentarians is against the spirit of equality between men and women. It tries to circumvent the Constitution by smuggling the idea of female only constituencies into other statutes through the proposed amendments to the Electoral Act.

In my view, this is unconstitutional, biased, unfair, sexist and should be resisted by all progressive Zimbabweans. Let us not accept everything that suggests advancement of women hook, line and sinker.

Fred Isaac Misi, Via e-mail.