From: as on
Zimbabwe Constitutional Revision Authorities Disclose Laptop Data
Tampering Hoax

http://www1.voanews.com/

Parliamentary Select Committee Co-Chairman Douglas Mwonzora told
journalists
at a weekly news conference in Harare that no such break-in occurred
and
that the rapporteur in question had lied about data tampering

Patience Rusere & Irwin Chifera | Washington 28 July 2010

The parliamentary committee running Zimbabwe's constitutional revision
process said Wednesday that it will discipline a public outreach
process
rapporteur who falsely charged that someone had broken into an office
in
the province of Matabeleland North and stolen information collected
during
meetings in Insiza district.

Parliamentary Select Committee Co-Chairman Douglas Mwonzora told
journalists
at a weekly news conference in Harare that no such break-in occurred
and
that the rapporteur in question had lied.

He said investigations showed that the rapporteur, a member of the
Movement
for Democratic Change formation of Deputy Prime Minister Arthur
Mutambara,
wanted to take his laptop home and when refused permission do do so
complained that files on his laptop had been tampered with and leaked
the
story to the press.

Mwonzora said laptops used by rapporteurs in the outreach exercise are
password-protected.

VOA Studio 7 correspondent Irwin Chifera reported from Harare on the
incident.

Meanwhile, a constitutional outreach meeting in Mutasa South,
Manicaland
province, was canceled Tuesday after suspected ZANU-PF supporters
caused a
commotion by objecting to the presence of school children at the venue.

The Independent Monitoring Group, a civil society consortium, issued a
statement saying that ZANU-PF supporters accused the headmaster of
Mutambara
Central Primary School of conspiring with local lawmaker Trevor
Saruwaka, a
member of the Movement for Democratic Change formation of Prime
Minister
Morgan Tsvangirai, to bring the students into the outreach meeting to
counter ZANU-PF positions on the new constitution.

The monitoring group also reported that villagers complained that
teachers
and nurses taking part in the meeting were not from the Mutasa South
constituency. The group said the villagers became so unruly that
Saruwaka,
an outreach team leader, had to leave the meeting, and the ZANU-PF
youth
militia dispersed the children.

Constitutional law lecturer Greg Linington of the University of
Zimbabwe
told VOA Studio 7 reporter Patience Rusere that such incidents
reflected a
general lack of understanding of the nature of a constitution, and that
such
acts of intimidation prevent free discussion by the people of what
should be
in the basic document.

Elsewhere, the Crisis In Zimbabwe Coalition said it intends to take the
constitutional revision outreach process to Zimbabweans in the
diaspora,
noting that the official meetings now in progress do not include
Zimbabweans
living outside the country although they account for about a quarter of
the
national population.

Crisis Coalition Regional Advocacy Officer Dewa Mavhinga said diaspora
outreach meetings will begin in South Africa on Friday, July 30, with
additional meetings to be held next week in Britain and Botswana.

Mavhinga said the parliamentary committee in charge of revision has not
made
a serious effort to collect the views of the several million
Zimbabweans
living elsewhere in Southern Africa or in the West.