Copac has received $1 million from Treasury towards completion of the thematic committee stage of the constitution-making process, which stalled early this month due to financial constraints.
Co-chairperson Edward Mkhosi (MDC-N) yesterday confirmed the Parliamentary constitution-making body was in dire need of extra funding to complete the thematic committee stage.
“The thematic committee stage has stalled due to lack of funding and we are in the process of holding meetings to discuss the supplementary budget that we need to complete the process,” said Mkhosi.
“This time the stalling of thematic committee meetings is not due to squabbles by political parties over the data analysis methods to be used, but it is due to lack of funds,” he said.
According to another Copac co-chairman, Munyaradzi Paul Mangwana (Zanu PF), $1,8 million was needed to fund the thematic committee and the drafting stages of the new Constitution.
“We received $1 million from Treasury two days ago but we still need an additional $800 000, to see us through up to the drafting stage. I am sure once we get the additional $800 000 the thematic committee stage will start rolling again,” Mangwana said.
He however said there had been some misconceptions on the issue of data analysis methods being used during the thematic committee stage.
“We have always agreed we were going to use both the qualitative and quantitative methods of collating data gathered from constitutional outreach programmes.
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The problem was just how the different political parties interpreted what we had resolved,” he said.
Recently, the Copac process was brought to a standstill after Zanu PF and the two MDCs failed to reach an understanding over data analysis methods to be used.
It now remains to be seen if the September deadline for the referendum will be met in view of the funding problem.
