Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe looks on while First Lady Amai Grace Mugabe votes. The country voted on a draft constitution on March 16, 2013., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.
After the rocketing, family reunion
August 19, 2013 Opinion & Analysis
Stephen Mpofu
Zimbabwe Herald
“After the decimation, a resolute march forward.” That must have been the war-cry of Zanu-PF — and perhaps of its opponents also — going into the just-ended harmonised elections.
The elections now lie behind us in the cold print of the annals of history, with some of the vanquished contestants roaming the political landscape like hobos and groping in the dark for a distant shoulder on which to rest their beleaguered head as they shed copious tears after the act.
The war song remained silent or muted however, for the obvious reason that the warriors could not foresee what lay beyond the opaque future until after navigating their way through it and holding it between their fingers to study its colour and then burst into song and dance which still resound throughout the country as the victors celebrate their huge kill.
Be that as it may, the triumphant Zanu (PF)’s war-cry has to resonate with the purpose of the party’s existence and pre-election purpose, which was to win the election, as well as deliver on promises posted on its manifesto to work harder still emancipating the people of this country, as a manifestation of its vision.
But since Zanu-PF will not rule only its members but the totality of the Zimbabwean nation, a national healing process that began during the inclusive government, that now lies in ruin, has to be pursued to re-integrate losers and victors in the election, into one powerful force to move the country forward through the implementation of various social and economic programmes.
Chief among them are the rehabilitation of the manufacturing sector now virtually on its knees and intensification of the indigenisation and empowerment policy to complete the process of entrusting the economy into the hands of Zimbabweans for its nurturing and protection as a bequest to future generations.
Then, of course, there is the need to also embark on the rehabilitation of infrastructure such as roads in both the urban and rural areas, as well as the railway network, which also suffered neglect as a result of malaise of sorts in the period that Zanu-PF and the two MDC formations were in power — one that resembled a journey of believers and non-believers — with the provision of necessary additional infrastructure to give the economy the necessary supports for its desired growth.
What all this suggests is that those who lost in the election and the winners must touch gloves as it were, as do pugilists in the ring after a bout before both step down, put on their clothes, go back home and live life as fellow citizens while the losers work harder to try their luck the next time.
That is precisely how Zimbabweans, winners or losers, should live and work together to develop their country as a family or better still, a people with vested interests in the growth of their economy and in the stability and security of all of us regardless of whatever ideologies to which each one of us or each political party subscribe.
Zimbabweans, black and white, should reconcile themselves to the reality that they belong in this country and that, as such, it is therefore futile of anyone to act like Trojan horses by smuggling into the motherland people driven by imperialist designs and hope that whatever ideas or money that they bring along will be for the entire benefit of Zimbabweans and not that of the imperialists and hegemonists themselves.
But, of course, to be excluded from blatant foreign political and economic exploiters of African natural resources are genuine private companies and state companies from all-weather friendly governments overseas engaging in, say, joint partnerships with Zimbabwean companies to inject the much-needed dose of medicine into the growth of our economy.
Partnerships between Zimbabwean companies and their genuine foreign business counterparts are a tried and tested mode of accelerating economic growth with benefits to either partner.
To begin with foreign companies doing business with their Zimbabwean counterparts stand to enjoy protection of their investment by the state, while, on the other hand the local partner benefits from the expertise as well as from a vertical transfer of technology from the parent company of the foreign partner.
Partnerships play a significant role in the creation of secondary industries in developing economies such as Zimbabwe’s and, as is already apparent, they are a major point of departure in the industrialisation process the world over.
In Zimbabwe, for instance, partners are being sought to start companies that will engage in the cutting and polishing of diamonds — undoubtedly the golden eggs of this country along with gold and, perhaps other precious stones that still lie pulsating with their glory beneath the ground.
Finished products out of such raw materials will carry an added value in their exports, a boon to the country’s economy.
Thus in the new country into which the recent elections ushered it might not be imprudent to mount a spirited hunt for genuine foreign as well as local partners to strengthen the hands of indigenous companies in delivering goods and services that the world at large hunger after, in a quest for the emancipation of the Zimbabwean economy and the people riding on its back.
What this also means is that impassioned please should now be sent out to Zimbabweans working abroad who have the requisite skills to come back home and jump into the driving seats of the economy side by side with their fellow Zimbabweans so that the promises that manifestos of different political parties carried vis-à-vis economic development in the country come to fruition to benefit all Zimbabweans regardless of their colour, religion or creed.
When all this is said and done, a picture that emerges is one of a Zimbabwe so prosperous, peaceful and stable that the country will become an unavoidable destination for investors.
The political hullabaloo in the aftermath of the election should not be allowed to tarnish the tranquil atmosphere under which Zimbabwe demonstrated to the world the kind of environment successful elections should be conducted.
For example, after the honourable but eventual most prominent loser in the election, Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, had cast his ballot in Mount Pleasant, Harare, he told the world Press in an evident, confident voice that the presidential vote was “a delayed re-run from 2008” which, it was obvious from his upbeat outlook, would settle scores as to who was who between him and President Mugabe.
Surely, the election results ought to have amicably and finally settled the scores between the two prominent political combatants, or should they have not?
Only Mr Tsvangirai, a son, like Comrade Mugabe, of the Zimbabwean soil can provide the answer to that question.
No comments:
Post a Comment