No more free handouts

Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa says there will be no more free handouts because they undermine individual initiative of the beneficiaries and brood dependency.

He said in his budget speech that government would instead guarantee delivery of core services at reasonable cost and let the people pay.

The Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front has been criticised for creating a dependency syndrome by promising people free handouts like seed and fertiliser instead of providing them at reasonable cost as Chinamasa is now saying.

Handouts do not only create a dependency syndrome but they also promote corruption as people are never sure of what they are supposed to get and cannot therefore account for what is stashed away by the distributors.

Below is the relevant section in the budget.

User-Pay Principle

426-Mr Speaker Sir, our people are generally ready to pay for services rendered, as well as goods provided.

427-We have no culture of free hand-outs expectations among the generality of our population. It is clear that the public is aware of the un-sustainability of free hand-outs.

428- If anything, where these are not targeted, they often undermine individual initiative of the supposedly beneficiary, brooding dependency.

429-The onus on us as Government is, therefore, guaranteeing delivery of core services at reasonable costs, mindful of the readiness of the public to play its part as it accesses such services.

430-Hence, where there is capacity to pay for provision of public services through improved investment in public infrastructure development, the implementation of the ZIM-ASSET programme will benefit from the application of the user pay principle.

431-Innovative application of this principle should also extend to the funding of collapsed urban public services, including the road network across our towns.

432-Mr Speaker Sir, what will also be critical is the ring-fencing of collected revenues for use in the areas they are intended for, thus, plugging out potential leakage holes.

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