THE Speaker of Parliament Advocate Jacob Mudenda has called
on political parties to take action against members who abscond parliamentary
sessions while the National Assembly will dock their sitting allowances.
Adv Mudenda made the ruling in the National Assembly on
Thursday as he expressed concern over “apparent dereliction of duty” by
legislators.
Zanu-PF has two thirds majority in Parliament while MDC
Alliance has 61 seats with National Patriotic Front (NPF) and an Independent
candidate, Temba Mliswa, having a seat each.
Adv Mudenda said on three occasions since last year,
Parliament was been forced to adjourn due to lack of quorum.
“The Chair is deeply concerned about the apparent
dereliction of duty by the Honourable Members who absent themselves after
registering their names on that day’s register resulting in the adjournment of
the House due to lack of quorum. Consequently, the Chair rules that with
immediate effect, all Honourable Members who are absent when the House adjourns
due to lack of quorum will not be paid their sitting allowances for that day,”
he said.
“To that end, the Chair is directing the Clerk of
Parliament to compile a list of those Honourable Members who will have been
absent with the view of disallowing their allowance in future. Further, I am
also directing the Clerk of Parliament to prepare a list of Members who are
consistently absent when there is no quorum in the House for sharing with their
respective political parties who must take corrective action accordingly.”
He said his decision is in line with Section 137 of the
Constitution of Zimbabwe and Parliamentary Standing Orders.
According to standing orders a quorum consists of 75
National Assembly members.
“The Chair has observed that since the commencement of the
Second Session of the 9th Parliament on Tuesday, 1 October 2019, the House has
had to adjourn prematurely due to the lack of quorum on three occasions as
follows:-Tuesday, 3rd December, 2019 there were only 61 Hon. Members present in
the House; Tuesday, 25th February, 2020 there were 59 Honourable Members
present. Wednesday, yesterday, 4th March 2020, 65 Honourable Members were
present,” he said. Herald
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