SUMMARY OF THE MAIN FEATURES OF THIS DRAFT CONSTITUTION Inorder to understand the main features of this Draft Constitution, it is important to revisit the main reasons why the NCA rejected the Draft by the Constitutional Commission of Zimbabwe and vigorously campaigned for a NO vote in the referendum of February 2000. The reasons are repeated here. Some of the reasons why NCA campaigned for a NO Vote 1. Process The process of making a constitution is as important as the content. The people must determine a process of constitution – making which they can dominate. In this way, the principle of democracy is fully entrenched as people will not, thereafter, allow any future government to change the constitution as it wishes. At the same time, a process determined and dominated by the people will ensure that their wishes are put into the constitution. The Constitutional Commission failed in this regard. It was appointed by the President, its timetable was set by the President and the President had the final say over what went into its Draft Constitution. After the Commission produced its draft, it did not go back to the people to check with them whether or not their inputs had been incorporated. Instead, it hurriedly submitted its Draft to the President, who actually changed some of the provisions. The Commission itself also ignored a number of issues raised by the people. The NCA process is totally different. For instance, the First Draft produced at the end of September 2001, unlike the Draft of the Constitutional Commission, was presented to the people for further debate and for them to say whether or not it reflected their views. In this way, the real views of the people could not be ignored. This Final Draft was produced at the Second All Stakeholders Conference in December 2001 and takes into account all the views expressed by the people. 2. Content The Draft of the Constitutional Commission had a number of provisions, which were not only contrary to what the people said, but were also not good for Zimbabwe. Some of them are as follows: • Executive Presidency The most serious problem in our current constitution is an all-powerful president with all sorts of powers. The Draft of the Constitutional Commission still provided for an executive president with almost similar powers to the current president, such as 4