HARARE – Sweeping changes to Zimbabwe’s constitution that will extend the presidential term by two years sailed through their final parliamentary hurdle Tuesday, now requiring only President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s signature to become law.

The amendments, which also scrap direct presidential elections, have been sharply criticised by opposition figures in parliament where the ruling Zanu PF party holds a parliamentary majority.

The National Assembly voted 226 to 41, the speaker announced, to accept the changes proposed by the Senate when it agreed to the new legislation on June 24.

The raft of changes – labelled a “constitutional coup” by critics – includes a provision that would extend the presidential and parliamentary terms from five to seven years.

This means that the last of Mnangagwa’s constitutionally limited two terms would be extended until 2030.

Another amendment gives parliament the power to appoint the president, doing away with direct presidential elections that were introduced in 1987, seven years after independence.

However, the later changes also open the way for a president to begin a fresh seven-year term when elected by parliament, lawyer and leading opposition figure Doug Coltart said.

This loophole could also allow parliament “to continually renew its own mandate without ever returning to the electorate,” he said.

“It’s an interpretation that we are now going to have to fight,” Coltart told AFP.

Opposition groups and lawyers charge that the amendments will entrench Zanu PF’s grip on power, after governing uninterrupted since independence in 1980.

They also argue that the amendments do not pass constitutional muster, pointing to provisions that prohibit an incumbent from benefitting from a change to term limit provisions. There are demands for the bill to be put to a referendum.

Mnangagwa, 83, came to power in 2017 in a military-backed coup that ousted Robert Mugabe at the age of 93 and after 37 years in power.

Justice minister Ziyambi Ziyambi said he did not expect Mnangagwa to dwell on signing the bill into law.

“The faster the bill is transmitted to His Excellency… normally when he gets bills he assents to them as and when he gets them,” he said outside parliament.