ZIMBABWE stands at a constitutional turning point.
The proposed amendment to extend presidential and parliamentary tenure is being presented as administrative housekeeping — efficiency, continuity, stability. Yet it is none of these. It alters the foundation of constitutional democracy: that political authority must periodically return to the people.
This amendment does not merely change the calendar.
It changes the ownership of power.
Nor does the tenure extension stand alone. A series of accompanying proposals quietly recalibrates the relationship between citizen, State and Constitution — not by abolishing democratic safeguards, but by relocating them.
From consent to convenience
Every Constitution answers a simple question: who ultimately decides?
In a democracy, the people decide regularly and predictably. Term limits exist precisely to prevent power from redesigning the rules under which it competes.
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Lengthening presidential terms from five to seven years weakens accountability by stretching the distance between mandate and renewal. Legitimacy depends not only on elections, but on their frequency.
Once incumbents can extend their own tenure, authority no longer flows from consent — consent becomes conditional upon authority.
The Constitution begins to serve those in power rather than power serving the Constitution.
Why term limits matter
Term limits are not administrative details. They are democratic guarantees.
They ensure renewal.
They prevent permanent incumbency.
They provide predictable accountability.
They protect citizens from negotiated continuity.
Extending tenure without direct popular approval is not reform — it is exemption from accountability.
This risk deepens when combined with the proposal that the President be elected by Parliament rather than directly by citizens. A President chosen by legislators depends on political majorities; a President chosen by citizens depends on national legitimacy. That distinction separates a constitutional republic from a parliamentary government — a transformation that cannot legitimately occur without the people themselves deciding.
The Parliament-only problem
The most consequential issue is not only the extension, but the method: attempting to achieve it through Parliament alone.
Representation cannot substitute participation when sovereignty itself is at stake. Altering tenure without a referendum transfers authority from citizens to majorities.
Numbers in Parliament cannot replace the voice of the nation.
The same logic applies to expanding presidential appointments to the Senate. Upper chambers restrain power; enlarging unelected appointments extends executive influence over oversight.
The quiet transfer of power
Constitutions erode less through dramatic repeal than through institutional redesign.
Removing public interviews for judicial appointments reduces transparency, where independence must be visible.
Transferring control of the voters’ roll away from an independent electoral authority alters electoral credibility before a single vote is cast.
Creating a delimitation body outside the electoral framework places constituency boundaries — and therefore electoral outcomes — under political influence.
Changing the Defence Forces’ duty from upholding the Constitution to merely acting in accordance with it replaces guardianship with compliance.
Eliminating constitutional commissions removes buffers between the citizen and State.
Individually technical, collectively structural — these measures relocate democratic safeguards away from citizens and toward authority.
Stability and legitimacy
Supporters argue that tenure extension brings stability. History shows the opposite.
Stability comes from predictable rules, not adjustable ones. When limits become negotiable, every political contest becomes existential and economic actors hesitate because tomorrow’s rules are uncertain.
Stability comes from limiting power, not extending it.
The issue, therefore, is legitimacy. Governments gain legitimacy by respecting inconvenient rules. Altering them for one’s own tenure converts legality into contestation.
Citizens may obey power.
They trust only legitimacy.
Once trust erodes, coercion rises and compliance falls. That is fragility, not stability.
Reform vs entrenchment
Zimbabwe does not suffer from excessive constitutional restraint. It suffers from insufficient constitutional implementation.
The Constitution already provides devolution, independent institutions, accountable governance and enforceable rights. Implementing these provisions would build confidence far more than extending tenure.
The nation does not need more years of power.
It needs more respect for rules.
The real choice
Zimbabwe now faces a clear choice.
A system where leaders periodically return to the people for renewal of mandate.
Or a system where authority determines the duration of its own legitimacy.
The first is constitutional democracy.
The second is a constitutional form without constitutional substance.
This moment asks whether the Constitution remains a covenant among citizens — or becomes an instrument of incumbency.
Defending constitutional limits is not opposition to the government.
It is the protection of legitimacy.
And legitimacy, once surrendered, is rarely restored by amendment.
