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By Staff Writer
The Community Democracy Engagement Organization has launched a Constituency and Parliament Participation Index that has seen Hon Marian Chombo, the legislator for Zvimba North, coming on top of the list.
The organisation said a decision by Treasury to introduce a constituency visit allowance is set to encourage legislators’ constant interaction with communities in their constituencies.
It was observed that some legislators became ‘constituency missing persons’ once they were elected into office with others only appearing back in constituencies when seeking re-election.
In a recent survey by the Community Democracy Engagement Organization, many members of Parliament do not have a regular presence in communities they represent, with some also having a poor parliament session presence.
“We hope the introduction of a constituency allowance incentive will encourage legislators to constantly visit constituencies that elected them. Through our surveys in various constituencies, we found that some members of parliament vanish once they are voted. A number of ommunities do not have political representation on various issues. Their grievances which are supposed to go through parliament are not heard as their MP won’t be available,” Taurai Munenzva, the Director of the Community Democracy Engagement Organization said.
Munenzva said a parliament register also shows that some of the constituencies lack representations in parliament as their legislators are hardly in the august house during sessions. That means community concerns which are channelled through the Office of the Member of parliament are not being attended to.
“We hope some of the MPs will be encouraged by the constituency visit allowance to visit and engage their communities and create robust parliament discussions and debates which are founded by community needs. It’s unfortunate that some legislators do not even know which government programs are being implemented in their constituencies as they are not in touch with their communities. This results in having legislators who will want to lure votes through vote-buying during election time – a situation that is not healthy.”
The organization said in Mashonaland West Province, Local Government Deputy Minister, Hon Marian Chombo is on top position on both constituency and parliament participation index.
“Being a deputy minister of one of the busiest ministries, Hon Chombo has been managing to attend to her constituency and parliament duties. According to our survey, her constituency presence stands on 86% and Parliament presence according to the parliament register is over 70% which puts Zvimba North constituency engagement in governance participation on top position in Mashonaland West Province.
“We need our MPs to visit us here and there so that they get to know our concerns and take them to where they are supposed to go. We know that an MP will not solve all our problems but his or her presence in listening to our concerns will allow our grievances to at least be heard by relevant authorities but if the Mp does not come back, then our communities lag behind. Such MPs are selling out on President Mnangagwa’s vision of ensuring an inclusive community development,” Chief Katizagombo, real nane Gibson Jenami, said.
The survey scrutinized the legislators constituency visits frequency, parliament and session’s presence, and number of government programs being implemented and being followed by the legislators.
