World Cup delays Zim constitution debate
Posted on June 25, 2010 | Category: Politics; Business, Sport
timeslive.co.za
Public meetings at which Zimbabweans were to discuss the country’s new constitution have been postponed in two main cities because of possible violence and because the meetings would clash with World Cup matches, one of the organisers says.
“The aim appears to be disruption and to make sure we don’t gather meaningful views,” he said. He did not name the groups, but indicated they were from Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party.
Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change party had got wind of the plans and were arranging counter strategies, he said. The meetings would therefore probably turn violent and there would be political clashes.
The other problem, he said, was the likelihood of a low turn out in the cities because COPAC was planning to hold meetings in the afternoons and evenings when people had finished work – when World Cup football games are screened.
The Harare and Bulawayo meetings would be held instead from July 12, the day after the World Cup final match.
Human rights groups based mostly in Zimbabwe’s rural areas have been reporting for months that Mugabe’s supporters have been threatening reprisals against people who express support for anything but Zanu-PF’s proposals to maintain Mugabe in a position of almost absolute power.
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