The Sunday Mail
Leroy Dzenga
Senior Reporter
WHEN the Pan-African Parliament (PAP) sat for its fourth general session from May 21 to June 4 in South Africa, not many people kept the event on their calendar.
PAP, which has its pride of place among the continent’s institutions, has, for some reason, not been able to generate any talking points in its 17-year history.
Even the coverage given to the event was not as generous relative to gatherings of a similar nature.
But it was a different story when PAP, which is made up of parliamentarians from 55 countries, gathered in Midrand, Johannesburg, for the first session of the year.
Zimbabwe’s delegation included Chief Fortune Charumbira (Senator and leader of delegation), Barbara Rwodzi (Chirimumanzu National Assembly), Pupurai Togarepi (Gutu South National Assembly and ZANU PF Chief Whip), Stars Mathe (Nkayi National Assembly) and Dr Tapiwa Mashakada (Hatfield National Assembly).
Zimbabwe naturally belongs to the Southern African caucus, which was pushing for the Presidency of the PAP bureau to be rotated.
Despite stiff resistance from caucases from West and Central Africa, Southern Africa determinedly pushed through their agenda, which forced the elections to be suspended.
But the campaign was not without incidents as parliamanterians brawled and scuffled. MP Babra Rwodzi became the face of struggle.
“Since its inception in 2004, the Pan-African Parliament has been a preserve of Central and Western African countries. The first president was from Tanzania, the second one was from Chad and the third one was from Nigeria,” she told The Sunday Mail.
“The problem came in 2015, when Rodger Nkondo from Cameroon expressed interest in becoming the PAP President, this is despite the fact that the parliament needed to rotate among all regions. There were concerns raised, but the candidates bullied their way.”
Francophone African countries enjoy numerical superiority and there is concern that once they tasted power, they became increasingly reluctant to rotate leadership of the continental body.
The PAP had a chance to cure the anomaly in the next election in 2018, but Nkondo decided to run again, promising that the rotation will be considered in 2021.
“Nkondo threw in his CV to be considered for presidency for the second time, despite knowing that it was time for rotation. They bullied their way through again, like they had done in the previous election,” she said.
Now that it is time to pick the next leader, two candidates from Central and West Africa are throwing their names into the hat, and this has been interpreted that the two regions are playing ping pong with the continental organ’s leadership.
Added Honourable Rwodzi: “When Nkondo retained his seat as President, the AU wrote to the PAP reminding them of the principle of rotation but it was never adhered to. That is when we saw that there was a problem.”
Being a member of PAP’s rules, privileges and discipline committee, Rwodzi was among the five who were supposed to preside over the election and when she raised the issue of rotation, her pleas fell on deaf ears.
That is when she decided to take a stand.
“I came to the plenary ready, I told the chairperson that we were not going to agree and I am going to block the election. Because I was a woman, they did not take me seriously. I was not ashamed of myself because I stand for justice and principle which has to be followed by the Pan-African Parliament.”
She does not regret her role in putting up what she believes was a principled stand against the flagrant disregard of standing rules.
Her efforts, which include grabbing a ballot box and vocalising against attempts to maintain a monopoly on the organisation’s leadership, have gone viral.
“I have never been busy on my phone as I have been in the past three days; it came as an awakening.
‘‘When I started this fight I never thought it would get attention from the world. I am not a social media person but people are sending me messages, articles, journalists are calling me and I have had to decline some interviews.”
Facts on barbra rwodzi
(in her own words)
I am married and have two children aged 26 and 18.
I am very passionate about everything I put my mind to.
I have been in politics for a while. In 2018 I thought of running to represent my people in a bid to change livelihoods in various ways in income-generating activities.
I have been in business since I was 19. I have run a number of businesses in various sectors.
I am passionate about the environment. I am passionate about the people of Chirumhanzu.
I have young women I mentor privately.
