By BARNABAS ZULU
THE UPND government is not scheming nor has intentions whatsoever elongate the presidential term from the constitutional five years to seven nor is it considering removing the 50+1 percent majority vote for a winning presidential candidate, Princes Kasune has assured.
Ms Kasune, the Minister of Justice has characterized Zambians who had been expressing fears that the UPND government was plotting to expunge from the Constitution the five-year presidential term and the 50+1 percent as nothing but doomsayers.
Delivering a ministerial statement in Parliament yesterday in which she laid down a constitutional amendment roadmap, Ms Kasune said President Hakainde Hichilema was elected on the majoritarian 50+1 percent and would therefore never want to reduce himself to a minority head of State after winning the 2026 general election.
She has dismissed claims that the proposed constitutional amendments were aimed at removing the 50+1 clause and replacing it with a first-past-the-post (FPTP) system.
“I want to make it very clear, for the avoidance of doubt, Honourable colleagues, and through you, Madam Speaker. There is no intention and there is no mention whatsoever in the provisions that we have mentioned under the new dawn government that we intend or need to increase the tenure of the president’s office to more than five years,” Ms. Kasune stated.
“I want to make it clear, Madam Speaker, through you, that there is no proposal for seven years. That is the message I am making unless the English is becoming difficult. There is no proposal, Honourable colleagues. Hear it from the horse’s mouth that there is no proposal to move the president’s tenure from five years to seven years. None of it,” she said.
Ms Kasune also told Parliament that there was no proposal to further amend the constitution to remove the 50+1 clause in the Constitution, stating that, probably, Mr Hichilema would never have been elected had it been on the first past the post system of electing a president.
“Secondly, to make it loud and clear, because we are all bound by the statements we make, there is no proposal of any provision to take away the 50+1 requirement for one to become president. It is a statement that will be made publicly to all of you, Honourable colleagues. I just want it to sink in so that those naysayers, who were adding things that do not exist, understand,” she said.
“To be categorical, Madam Speaker, as I wind up, this President of the Republic of Zambia, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema, he became president because of that provision, the 50+1. Without it, maybe he would not have been president today. It is an important clause that we need to guard and safeguard as Zambians so that we are not ruled by the lesser majority of those that get fewer percentages,” Ms Kasune said.
