PRIME Minister Morgan Tsvangirai was on the ropes last night after a showdown with MPs over his call for constitutional reforms to relax anti-gay laws.
Tsvangirai lit the fuse on the controversial subject after giving an interview to the BBC in London, which was broadcast on Monday.
Despite previously endorsing President Robert Mugabe’s vow that gay rights were not up for discussion in the new constitution which is at the drafting stage, Tsvangirai stunned even his supporters by performing a volte-face in London.
“Of course there is a very strong cultural feeling towards gays but to me it’s a human right,” Tsvangirai, evidently a transformed man from just a year before, told the BBC.
His new stance set the stage for testy exchanges in Parliament on Wednesday in his inaugural British-style Prime Minister’s Questions.
It was Dorcas Sibanda, an MP from his MDC-T party, who raised the issue even as Tsvangirai’s aides were trying to draw a line over the controversy.
Sibanda wanted to know if Tsvangirai had been quoted correctly, calling for a constitution that favours gay rights.
“My personal view does not matter,” Tsvangirai began, showing no appetite to repeat what he had told the BBC just three days earlier.
“This is an elitist debate when people have no food, when people have no jobs, when people have so many problems. It is a diversionary attitude, to try and put this issue at the focus of the nation is a real diversionary. There are more important issues to deal with.”
A few MPs muttered incomprehensibles, others heckled while most from his MDC-T party opted for polite silence.
He had a joke prepared to diffuse the tensions, telling MPs: “Perhaps I am speaking here kuda mumwe musi mungangodai muringochani panapa (Perhaps I am speaking here and some of you may be gays). What you do in your private sphere is your own problem, not mine.”
Laughter in the House, and Tsvangirai had bought himself some breathing space.
Borrowing from a line which has been trotted out by his party since his BBC interview aired, Tsvangirai added: “The people of Zimbabwe are writing a constitution in which they would like to define their society, articulating issues they want. So who am I to question their wisdom if they decide to include the question of gay rights into the constitution?”
Some in Tsvangirai’s camp say that is the position he should have adopted in the BBC interview and refused to nail his colours to the mast. Now his party is in damage limitation mode, intent to be on the right side of the debate on a controversy fast turning into an election issue.
Tsvangirai’s discomfort has been a boon for Zanu PF which has not only pointed to his policy muddle but sought to align itself with the public mood, which is strongly opposed to legitimising homosexual acts in the new constitution.