via Plot to kill Zesa flops | The Herald October 24, 2013
CLERK of Parliament Mr Austin Zvoma has written to the Registrar of the High Court and the Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet demanding the return of Electricity Amendment Act 2013 which sought to unbundle Zesa Holdings into an indeterminate number of privately- owned successor companies.
The planned unbundling and privatisation — which was reportedly being orchestrated by some officials at the Energy and Power Development Ministry in cahoots with former minister Mr Elton Mangoma — would have effectively put the critical power sector into the hands of unknown Western investors picked at Mr Mangoma’s discretion.
Sources close to developments say everything was being done without the knowledge of the incumbent minister, Cde Dzikamai Mavhaire, amid reports that officers at Zesa were already working on logos for the new companies, again without the knowledge of the minister.
Cde Mavhaire refused to shed light on the matter last night, saying he does not work at night, while efforts to get comment from Mr Mangoma or Zesa Holdings were fruitless, with the former continually cutting off calls made to his mobile.
The Amendment Bill was hurried through Parliament by MDC-T legislators, who took advantage of the fact that their Zanu-PF counterparts were holed in their constituencies for the party’s primary elections.
The Bill was passed before being sent for Presidential assent, which was, however, granted after the mandatory 21 days had lapsed, making the resultant Act a legal nullity.
Section 51 of the old Constitution, which was still operational ahead of the effective date of the new Constitution, stated that:
(1) Subject to the provisions of section 52 and Schedule 4, the power of Parliament to make laws shall be exercised by Bills passed by the House of Assembly and the Senate and assented to by the President.
(2) When a Bill is presented to the President for assent he shall, subject to the provisions of this section, within twenty-one, days, either assent or withhold his assent.
The Electricity Amendment (No.5 of 2013) Act sought to repeal Section 68 of the Electricity Act (Chapter 13:19) which was to be replaced with a new Section 68 Formation of Successor Companies which stipulates that:
(1) The Minister shall, not later than six months after the fixed date, take such steps as are necessary under the Companies Act (Chapter 24:03) to secure the formation of one or more of the following companies limited by shares, which shall be the successor company or successor companies to the Authority –
(a) a company to take over the electricity generation plants of the Authority;
(b) a company to take over the transmission system of the Authority;
(c) a company to take over from the Authority the distribution and supply of electricity;
(d) such other companies as the Minister may approve.
The proviso, ‘’ such other companies as the Minister may approve’’ was a clear blank cheque to Mr Mangoma and crew to do what they wanted with a key state enterprise.
Apart from the personal profit motive, sources say there was also a clear political motive to destroy Zesa or put it beyond the influence of Government which would then have been at the mercy of the private investors linked to the MDC-T.
This would have left the succeeding Zanu-PF Government at the mercy of the investors who would have used power for political leverage as power has been identified as a key enabler of Government’s new economic blueprint, the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim Asset).
In pursuit of unconstitutional regime change, MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai is on record asking South Africa to cut off Zimbabwe’s fuel and power supplies to abet his party’s cause.
COMMENTS
Hello! There’s an awful lot of inference packed into the last few paragraphs of that article! Is even a single bit of this substantiated?
As is usual with the Herald, all sorts of serious allegations are thrown around, that are later found out to not be true. The Herald seems to prefer to write first and ask questions later. Their reporters have never let the truth stand in the way of a good story. Why start now?
Parastatals such as Companies that supply essential services such as electricity, water,government hospitals, postal services,railways etc.
Should be run as a public service, with enough revenue generated to pay for running costs and provision for future exspansion, they are not private companies that exist to make profit. Unfortunately all these government/Zanupf run companies have been plundered and destroyed, Zanupf starting at independance should have known that these services would be available to a larger proportion of the ever growing population and so like any good planner would have slowly introduced upgrades, improvements and exspansion over the last 33 years to keep up, but instead they have stolen from these companies one way or another and reduced them to Bankruptcy. Normally the only way out of this debt cycle is to privatise these companies, but a private owner will want profit generated over and above running costs which means the public will have to pay much more for these services.
These companies are so debt ridden they can no longer offer reliable service maybe they should be privatised so that we can once again have clean running water, electricity, a working rail system, a working airline etc.etc. because Zanupf has failed to run these Companies over the last 33 years is that not proof enough to themselves that they have no clue how to run an efficient business/service? If they exercise a bit of democracy why don,t they let the Zimbabwean public vote on it?
Imbwa dza Mugabe. What kind of journalsim is this. You think your readers are fools. Work up Herald, we are not in the 17th century.
Hallo, Herald reporters. Let’s leave MDC people and Western Nations and concentrate on building our country. Takahwina maelections saka let us concentrate on delivering. The gospel of finger pointing must stop. Chero vanoverenga vanobva vati havo vatanga!
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