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Parliamentary Monitor: Issue 05
Parliamentary Monitoring Trust (Zimbabwe)
February 08, 2013

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Concerned about the draft Constitution

Thanks (for uploading the draft constitution). We have few concerns pertaining to the final draft constitution: Firstly in Chapter one, Founding Provisions, Section six, Koisan is named as one of the official languages of Zimbabwe. What is Koisan language? The San people of Zimbabwe belong to the Khoe language families and they would rather prefer to be called San and their language is Tshwao/Tshao/Tsoa. The official code for this language is ISO 639-3: hio. If the language is then called Koisan Language, how is it going to be different from the Khoe languages found in other countries.

The San people live some 220km away from Bulawayo, how are we going to alert them about the name change and get their views as to whether their accept their language to be called Koisan. The San people have been crying that things are imposed on them, they are never consulted and their are perceived to be unsophisticated and primitive. The draft further goes on to say a lot of thing Sub-section 4 "The state must promote and advance the use of all languages used in Zim including sign language and must create conditions for the development of these language" This is good considering that there are only 11 speakers of the Tshwao language from an estimated population of 2500 San people between Tsholotsho and Plumtree. Chapter 2 National objectives, Section 16, If this is done, fine with us.

Section 33 again on the preservation of traditional knowledge is welcomed. Lastly on the declaration of rights, there are a number of interesting thing coming out especially on shelter, provision of clean water, education and use of one's language. Overall, the constitution is no that bad but we could have been consulted further to clarify certain issues.

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