THE UK is holding its first constitutional outreach meeting in London on Saturday to give Zimbabweans an opportunity to submit views on a new charter for the country.
The meeting, hosted by the Zimbabwe Diaspora Development Interface (ZDDI) – the umbrella body for UK-based Zimbabwean organisations – will be held at the London Met University.
Participants will make contributions around the main talking points used by the Constitutional Parliamentary Committee (COPAC), but with a major focus on issues that have greater resonance with Zimbabweans living in the Diaspora, organisers said.
ZDDI will collate the output from the outreach meeting into a document that would be submitted directly to COPAC.
ZDDI chairman Dr Alex Magaisa challenged Zimbabweans in the UK to be the change they wanted to see by coming forward to express their views at the London Met University meeting on Saturday.
“We need to get the authorities in Zimbabwe to recognise the value of their foreign-based human capital, and this constitutional reform exercise presents the Zimbabwe Diaspora with an opportunity to be proactive in advocating for their rights,” Magaisa said on Thursday.
“We in the Diaspora must recognise that any new Constitution will affect us and our children in many ways but if we do not take action to be heard we can have no one to blame but ourselves.”
Driven by the country’s protracted economic and political crisis to seek opportunities and refuge elsewhere, Zimbabweans in exile have nonetheless remained connected with their homeland.
Magaisa added: “The majority lead parallel lives in which we exert ourselves emotionally and materially to sustain livelihoods both in our countries of domicile as well as in Zimbabwe.
“These binding ties mean that we in the Diaspora, quite rightly, consider ourselves to be intrinsic members of the Zimbabwean family.”
He said following reported sentiments by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai that the final outcome of the ongoing constitution-making exercise may be negotiated between the three main political parties, Zimbabweans in the UK had a duty “to ensure that the Diaspora’s voice is not absent or muted”.
The outreach meeting will be held between 10:30am – 2pm in Room SH2-09, Stapleton House, at London Met University’s main campus on 166-200 Holloway Road, London, N7 8DB, only a minute’s walk from Holloway Tube Station. Visit their website: http://www.zimdiasporainterface.org/