HARARE - Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) executive director, Irene Petras, has called for an audit of government deals involving foreign entities amid fears that many of the so-called 'bilateral agreements' were being used to funnel money to Zanu (PF).In an interview with The Zimbabwean, Petras said there was no transparency and accountability in many of the so-called ‘joint venture’ agreements the government was concluding with foreign partners.
“There’s no transparency and accountability in the ministries,” Petras said, adding that parliament’s oversight role had been subverted by shrewd politicians. Petras’ comments came as it emerged that Zimbabwe was importing power from South Africa, only to export it to Namibia to fulfil the terms of an agreement the Mugabe regime made with Windhoek before the unity government was formed last year.
“You have to do an audit of all these deals (to establish who is benefiting from what),” Petras said. She said Zimbabweans would ultimately bear responsibility for the agreements and it was their right to be informed at the outset about what the government was signing itself into.
The government has recently signed a number of agreements with countries like China, Russia, Botswana and South Africa, but it is feared they could just be ways of putting money into Zanu (PF) pockets before the party loses power.
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