If Mnangagwa Withholds Motlanthe Commission Report He Would Have Confirmed He Is No Different From Mugabe- Magaisa

In the latest installment of the BSR, academic and constitutional law expert Alex Magaisa explains why President Mnangagwa has a duty to publish the report of the Commission of Inquiry.

Magaisa argues that Mnangagwa already exercised his discretion by making a public undertaking to publish the report. Mnangagwa should honor his promise to make the report public once it is completed. Magaisa also argues that if Mnangagwa does not publicise the report it will be interpreted as an admission of culpability and therefore an effort to cover up. He also argues that if Mnangagwa fails to publish the Motlanthe Commission report it will confirm he is no different from his predecessor Robert Mugabe. Part of Magaisa’s article reads:

In any event, it would be a serious indictment on Mnangagwa if he withheld the report from the public because he would have confirmed that he is no different from his predecessor, Robert Mugabe. Mnangagwa has spent the past year trying desperately, but without much success, to prove that he is different from his old mentor. As Mugabe’s chief enforcer for many years, the shadow of the old master follows him everywhere and it has been hard to shake off. He has to do things differently.

However, there is nothing new is appointing a commission of inquiry to investigate a matter because even Mugabe had similar commissions before. What would be different would be to go one step further and release the report, however unpalatable it might be to him or his associates.

Mugabe’s legacy in this area is that reports of such commissions were usually kept a secret. The most notorious are reports into inquiries over Gukurahundi in the 1980s. They have never been released (and Mnangagwa should also open up on those and release them). A refusal by Mnangagwa to release the Motlanthe Commission’s report would therefore hardly be surprising but disastrously for him, it will be seen as part of the package of continuities of the old era.

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It would, therefore, be a public relations disaster for someone who has been trying so hard to give the appearance of running a “new dispensation”. How can it be a new dispensation if it does precisely what the old regime was doing? Having invested so much on an image spruce-up, withholding the report or parts of it from the public would reverse any gains made on the international front. Critics saw this commission as a show for the international community; as a bid to impress after the disastrous events of 1 August which means keeping the outcome a secret would probably make it worse.

Read Magaisa’s Full BSR Here