President Mnangagwa officially opened the 10th Parliament at the Parliament Building in Mt Hampden.
By Godwin Makoho
Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) legislators were in no show at the 10th Parliament Official Opening this Tuesday afternoon, despite accepting invitations and checking in at Harare hotels booked ahead of the ceremony.
His Excellency, president Emmerson Mnangagwa officially opened the First Session of the 10th Parliament, outlining the bills that will be tabled in this session. He also presented the State of the Nation Address where he touched on the achievements, challenges and the national vision going ahead.
The CCC legislators comprising 103 MPs and 27 senators, remained in their hotel rooms as proceedings went on smoothly at the New Parliament building in Mt Hampden in their absence.
All the 279 legislators were sworn in on the 7th of September and were expected to attend the first seating scheduled for today, October the 3rd.
In an interview with journalists just after the ceremony, the Head of Parliamentary Business, Honorable Ziyambi Ziyambi said business will continue with or without the opposition legislators.
“The train has begun to move and no one is going to stop it. There is going to be parliamentary committees and those who are there will be in those committees and we are ready for work,” said Hon Ziyambi.
“The state is not going to cater for the expenses of Members of Parliament who snub national events. For the parliament to run, it needs a President but they were not here to listen to the President,” added Hon Ziyambi.
“Every decision made by the National Assembly cannot be successful without the approval of the president and the people who voted them also voted for the president and should respect His Excellency,” said Hon Ziyambi.
Speaker of Parliament, Advocate Jacob Mudenda ruled that Parliament would look into the truancy with a view of sanctioning the CCC legislators.
Yesterday, fugitive CCC spokesperson Promise Mkwananzi announced that their MPs and Senators would boycott the ceremony to send a message in demand for fresh elections to elect the president of Zimbabwe.
They claim that they don’t recognize president Mnangagwa’s presidency.
However, in terms of Zimbabwean law, president Mnangagwa was duly elected to the position of the Head of State and Government and he was sworn into office after no one challenged the election outcome as required by the law.
