‘Security sector reforms part of GPA’
By Tichaona Sibanda
The MDC-T’s deputy Justice Minister, Obert Gutu, on Wednesday defended his party’s demands for security sector reform before the next general elections.
He also came down heavily on statements made by senior ZANU PF ministers that the security sector reforms were not part of the GPA.
Defence Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa and State Security Minister Sydney Sekeramayi have both recently claimed that parties pushing for reform are driven by regime change motives as they seek to weaken the country’s security services.
But the deputy minister told SW Radio Africa’s Hidden Story program that statements by ZANU PF officials demonizing the MDC-T’s demands exceeded the bounds of decency.
‘Article 13 of the GPA clearly states that the security services must be apolitical, professional and impartial…we are not seeking to reinvent the wheel. We are not asking for additional provisions to be inserted in the GPA, all we are saying is the three parties that are in the coalition government must honour the agreement, nothing else.
‘So anyone who thinks there should be no security sector reforms when Article 13 is there in black and white is obviously overdue for a psychiatric examination,’ Gutu said.
He said the way ZANU PF was reading the GPA showed a lack of coherent political vision and sincerity. ZANU PF has insisted security reforms are meant to weaken the armed forces and claim it is a western sponsored project to change the leadership of the country’s security services.
Responding to this Gutu said: ‘Those statements are a pack of lies and fallacies, unmitigated hogwash as well as a deliberate distortion of facts.”
Gutu, a lawyer by profession, deplored the persistence of service chiefs in making hostile statements, which he said have become the core mantra of the state media campaign against the MDC-T.
The deputy minister described some of the statements as compelling evidence of ZANU PF’s instigation and support of violence in Zimbabwe.
He said this is in relation to a statement Tuesday by the Commissioner-General of the police, Augustine Chihuri, who said the security chiefs will neither meet nor engage with Prime Minister Tsvangirai. Chihuri went on to describe Tsvangirai and the MDC-T as ‘malcontents.’
Gutu said: ‘In our demands for security sector reforms, we are not saying the service chiefs should be fired or dismissed. The GPA does not say that. All we are asking for is for the role of the security sector to be clearly defined because these are constitutional bodies that should not meddle in politics.
‘You cannot wear a uniform as a police commissioner and at the same time chant political statements. Any police officer or soldier who wears their regalia and goes on a podium and start addressing issues politically, openly declaring their political allegiance and openly vilifying and maligning other political parties in the country, needs to be fired on the spot,’ he said.
Dewa Mavhinga, a senior Africa researcher with Human Rights Watch in London, agreed that the GPA’s article 13 provides that state organs (including the security sector) and institutions do not belong to any political party and should be impartial and non-partisan in the discharge of their duties.
He told us that parties to the GPA agreed that for the purpose of ensuring that all state organs and institutions perform their duties ethically and professionally, they must be trained on subjects like human rights, international humanitarian law and statute law.
‘This is for the members of the armed forces to understand and fully appreciate their roles and duties in a multi-party democratic system and ensure that all state organs and institutions strictly observe the principles of the rule of law and remain non-partisan and impartial,’ Mavhinga said. SW Radio Africa
