Canadian Senator Sharon Carstairs, President of the Committee of the Human Rights of Parliamentarians of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), noted today “with utmost concern” that in none of the cases concerning incumbent and former legislators in Zimbabwe, including Mr. Tendai Biti, Mr. Nelson Chamisa, Mr. Paul Madzore and Mr. Job Sikhala, have the authorities complied with their constitutional duties, nor has the parliament effectively exercised its oversight function. On the contrary, law enforcement agencies have been allowed to continue torturing and ill-treating members of parliament with complete impunity”.
The Committee hopes that “the newly elected parliament will take its oversight function more seriously and use its powers to ensure that the law enforcement agencies do their duty”, Senator Carstairs said in her report to the IPU Governing Council today.
During its session in Cape Town, the Committee examined the cases of 220 legislators, among them public cases in: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Burundi, Colombia, Ecuador, Egypt, Eritrea, Honduras, Lebanon, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Palestine/Israel, the Philippines, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Zimbabwe.
On other matters, the IPU Governing Council proposed that the IPU - as part of its work to promote democracy - encourage national parliaments to celebrate the International Day of Democracy that will be celebrated for the first time on 15 September 2008, following the adoption of a resolution by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2007. The IPU will also organize activities to commemorate the event.
The IPU Governing Council has decided to affiliate the Parliament of Lesotho and to suspend the Parliament of Bangladesh.
It has also decided to take the necessary steps to admit the Parliament of Palestine as a Member of the IPU and, to that end, instruct the Executive Committee to meet in extraordinary session to prepare the relevant amendment to the IPU Statutes and circulate it to the IPU Members for its adoption in Geneva at the next Assembly in October 2008.
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