BY SILENCE MUGADZAWETA Zimbabwe has lost its voting rights in the General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) over US$81 000 debt.
Zimbabwe became a member of the UN on 25 August 1980.
In a statement by the UN dated 13 January 2021, Zimbabwe is listed among ten countries that are in arrears under the terms of Article 19 of the Charter of the United Nations.
Article 19 of the UN states, “Member of the United Nations which is in arrears in the payment of its financial contributions to the Organization shall have no vote in the General Assembly if the amount of its arrears equals or exceeds the amount of the contributions due from it for the preceding two full years. The General Assembly may, nevertheless, permit such a Member to vote if it is satisfied that the failure to pay is due to conditions beyond the control of the Member.”
Others countries on the list are Central African Republic (US 29 395), Comoros (US 871 632), Congo (US 90 844), Islamic Republic of Iran (US 16 251 298), Libya (US 705 391), Niger (US 6 733) Sao Tome and Principe (US 829 888), Somalia (US 1 443 640), and South Sudan (US 22 804).
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Last year, Central African Republic, Lesotho and The Gambia had their voting privileges suspended over failure to pay required member dues.