AFRICA - House Foreign Affairs Committee Democrats

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line had passed in late January. Although the Registrar General was required by
law to provide a copy of the voters rolls used in the March presidential election, the
MDC still was unable to obtain one by year’s end.
During the year, the NCA, an umbrella organization comprising most of the country’s
important civil society groups, continued to press for consideration of a new
constitution that would reduce the power of the presidency and offer greater protection
for civil liberties. In a nationwide referendum in 2000, voters defeated the draft
constitution prepared by the Constitutional Commission that would have maintained
a strong presidency.
The ruling party’s candidates continued to benefit from the ZANU-PF’s control of
the state-owned firms that dominate the country’s economy, from its control of the
state-monopolized broadcast media (see Section 2.a.), and from its control over state
funds granted to political parties. Under the Political Parties Finance Act (PPFA),
the Government is required to allocate $125,000 (Z$100 million) among political parties
in proportion to the parties’ seats in the Parliament, provided the party has at
least 15 seats. In 2001 the Government amended the PPFA to prohibit foreign funding
for political parties. Political rights groups declared that the amended act was
designed to cut off funding for the opposition, although ZANU-PF routinely ignored
the PPFA’s prohibitions without consequences.
Many persons who were perceived as opposition supporters by the Government,
were removed from the civil service and the military.
There were 17 women in the 150-seat Parliament, including the Deputy Speaker
of Parliament, and there were 4 female ministers and 1 female deputy minister in
the Cabinet. In addition, there was one woman governor. Women participated in
politics without legal restriction; however, according to local women’s groups, husbands,
particularly in rural areas, commonly directed their wives to vote for the
husband’s preferred candidates. The ZANU-PF congress allotted women one out of
every three party positions and reserved 50 new positions for women on the party’s
180-member Central Committee, which was one of the party’s most powerful organs.
All major ethnic groups were represented in Parliament and in the Government;
however, most members of the Government and the Parliament, as well as most
ZANU-PF officials, belong to the Shona ethnic group, which composed 82 percent
of the population (see Section 5).
Section 4. Governmental Attitude Regarding International and Nongovernmental Investigation
of Alleged Violations of Human Rights
The Government permitted local civic and human rights groups to operate, but
it monitored their activities closely. The Government usually was unresponsive to
the concerns of NGOs and rarely consulted with them during the year. National
groups that promoted human rights included: The Amani Trust; the Bulawayo Legal
Projects Centre; the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP); the Child
and the Law Project; the Legal Resources Foundation; the Media Institute of Southern
Africa; the Musasa Project; National Alliance of Nongovernmental Organizations;
the NCA; the Southern African Foundation of the Disabled; Transparency
International-Zimbabwe; the Women’s Action Group; Women and AIDS Support
Network; Women and Law in Southern Africa; Women in Law and Development in
Africa; the Zimbabwe Elections Support Network; the Zimbabwe Human Rights
NGO Forum; Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights; the Zimbabwe Liberators Platform;
the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists; the Zimbabwe Women Lawyers Association;
Zimbabwe Women’s Resource Centre and Network; Zimcet; and ZimRights.
Domestic NGOs worked on human rights and democracy issues, including lobbying
for revision of the POSA and AIPPA, increasing poor women’s access to the
courts, raising awareness of the abuse of children, eliminating irregularities in voter
rolls, conducting voter education, preserving the independence of the judiciary, and
eliminating torture, arbitrary detention, and restrictions on freedom of the press
and assembly. The Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum has taken the lead in coordinating
reports on human rights violations and abuses in the period prior to and
following the 2000 elections.
During the March presidential election campaign only the Government-sponsored
ESC and government-approved NGOs were permitted to carry out voter education.
On September 13, the Government signaled its intention to step up its oversight
of NGOs, many of which they accused of supporting opposition political activity. It
published a notice saying it would begin enforcing the 1995 Private Voluntary Organizations
(PVO) Act requiring all PVOs to apply for registration with the Ministry
of Social Welfare. Most PVOs had ignored the 1995 Act and expressed concern that
enforcement of it would give the Government excessive control over their activities.
Government ordered all nonregistered PVOs to cease operations until they registered,
a process that generally takes approximately 8 months. On November 16,
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