By Wisdom Mumera
(Zimbabwe) – In the immediate aftermath of the July 31 electoral results announced the MDC-T went into overdrive flooding the courts with petitions contesting the results.
With time most of them were dismissed, dropped or failed.
Right now the party has adopted what is being called a ‘tongai tione’ stance (wait and see approach). They have falsely relinquished ambitions to seek redressal for their claims of rigged polls, deciding to give the ZANU (PF) majority government the free room to rule.
This supposed backsliding is however in the knowledge that the economy is in a tight spot.
Industry is shuffling at nether levels, with low capacity utilisation, obsolete machinery, erratic power supply and high costs of capital all serving to constrain its progress.
Recently the Harare City Council retrenched 1000 workers in a move aimed at streamlining operations, removing an excess workforce and leaving a core unit that won’t burden the income it gets.
Taking advantage of the popular will and sentiment government has also decided to cap the salaries and perks for parastatal bosses at US$6000.
Again the move is aimed at paying what is cognizant of the income which the government is getting instead of a unilateral payment that ignores the perilous state of the state’s fiscal position.
It’s a foregone conclusion that the majority of the people will applaud the move. The various CEO’s have been getting way beyond logic and to see them getting humane salaries will gladden many.
However in the bigger picture this latest scheming from the government is the most brazen show of its desperate situation financially since the move, as reported in the Herald, is likely to invite a lot of court battles.
The CEO’s who signed contracts stipulating they would get all those sky-high salaries cannot be trusted not to run to the courts and suing the government for breach of contract.
The government has been scavenging for financial assistance from every nook and crevice and this latest scheme though noble is the most revealing. It just goes to show how stranded the government has become.
In the political context it will be a pleasing factor for the ‘tongai tione’ camp, which has been silently craving for more economic fissures to open up and swallow the government.
Recently Information Minister Jonathan Moyo came out in the media dismissing any idea of another GNU as mooted by Tsvangirai. However what Tsvangirai has simply been doing is dangle what he equates to a rod of help to fish the financially embattled government from the mire of a deflating economy.
He is testing waters to see when the ruling ZANU (PF) government will give in and seek for comradeship against the enemy of an economy under siege.
However on his own side Tsvangirai is forgetting that he went into the previous GNU being seen by many as the man who had wealthy friends who could assist the country. He had America, Britain, Canada and the whole lot of wealthy nations that could simply drop minuscule packages of their millions and salvage the country from liquidity challenges.
That never happened.
The then Finance Minister Tendai Biti repented and began speaking of eating what we killed. The foreign investments never materialized and Tsvangirai became a liar in the eyes of many.
That scrubbed off a certain glow from his shining armour leading to desertion when poll time came.
With that knowledge its quiet plain to ZANU (PF) that Tsvangirai does not possess any kind of special financial touch which they can utilise if they incorporate him back into the government.
Thus for now he has to content himself with a ‘tongai tione’ stance.
Back to the scavenging government. The seeming confusion over the Marange-Zimunya Community Ownership Share Trust has once again exhibited the absence of clarity in the Indigenisation laws, a factor which has already been pointed to as a stumbling block to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).
The mining companies are refusing that they pledged the cumulative figure of US$40million whilst Saviour Kasukuwere is adamant that they did and the Marange community is baying for the money.
To think that the Community Trust was launched by the President!
Its universal knowledge that indigenisation laws are not only existant in Zimbabwe but everywhere even in countries such as Australia where they are even more stringent.
The local problem has however been about the lack of clarity about the laws. This has created unnecessary fears and misunderstandings leading to investors hesitating to come in and invest their money.
At a time when Indigenisation is the catchword in Zim Asset and the policy is the focal point in the country, it’s frightening and confusing to find existant arguments over something that could be so banal.
How the situation ever came to a point of such confusing reinforces the arguments that the law of Indigenisation should be clarified.
In its country brief the Africa Development Bank states the point clearly.
“In particular, clarity on the Government’s approach towards the implementation of the indigenization and empowerment regulations will be critical. It will be important for the government to ensure that its policies do not reverse the economic gains and momentum attained during the life of the Inclusive Government”, it says.
The gains from the inclusive government largely consist of a stabilized economy but it’s the future after the GNU where indigenisation is set to play a central role that needs a thorough working.
If the implementation continues to be such as the one being seen in the mudslinging in Marange then for the foreseeable future the tongai tione camp will get maximum satisfaction as the economy continues to stutter.
The MDC’s are now derelicts shells of what they used to be. Time and squabbles has carved out the substance they may have once had, leaving them as clanging alarmists always predicting the dire and catastrophic.
Behind the mask of Biti calling for the creation of a United Democratic Front (UDF) is a gloating person happy to see the ruling government fail to deal with the prevailing situation.
The ultimate suffering of the masses becomes collateral damage accruing from the bigger agenda of having ZANU PF fail as a government so that it can seek for assistance from them.
For all the love the MDC-T may have for the large body of the nation, its ready to suffer the brunt of having the same people sweating out their intestines in hunger so that the reality of ZANU (PF)’s failures economically can manifest.
The onus is thus on ZANU to make sure the Indigenisation laws mean one thing and steal away the gloating from those who are waiting to see the country plunging into economic destruction, just so the world can see that an opponent has failed.
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