HARARE, Feb 17 (Reuters) - Veterans of Zimbabwe's liberation war mounted a court challenge on Tuesday to proposed changes to the constitution that would extend presidential terms from five years to seven, allowing President Emmerson Mnangagwa to stay in office until 2030.
Mnangagwa, 83, was meant to step down in 2028, after serving two five-year terms. There has been a succession battle in the ruling ZANU-PF party over how to replace him.
The president came to power after a 2017 military coup ousted post-independence leader Robert Mugabe. The latter's 37 years in power were strongly supported by the veterans who helped him defeat white minority rule before independence from Britain in 1980.
The challenge, by six veterans, alleges that the changes, which also include a provision that the president be elected by parliament rather than through a direct popular vote, are unconstitutional.
"The bill seeks, in both design and effect, to prolong the 1st respondent's incumbency and current term of office," the court papers read.
"That constitutional violation is further deepened by the manifest intention not to hold a referendum, notwithstanding the constitution's entrenched safeguards against unilateral alteration of the democratic tenure framework".
Zimbabwe government spokesperson Nick Mangwana said: "The people who have made this court application are only six individuals out of the thousands of war veterans in this country."
Speaking by telephone, he added that they had a "right to represent themselves and their own personal views".
Lovemore Madhuku, the lawyer representing the war veterans, said the cabinet amending the constitution and putting it to a parliamentary vote - where it will face little opposition from the ZANU-PF majority that controls both houses - rather than holding a referendum, defied constitutional norms.
"If the court agrees, they (the veterans) will seek an order that nullifies the bill," he said.
(Reporting by Chris Takudzwa Muronzi; Editing by Tim Cocks and Alex Richardson)
