Zimbabweans have no common vision- Biti

Zimbabweans have no common vision and as such the country is very fragile and has a limited capacity to deliver core services to the majority of the people, Finance Minister Tendai Biti said last week.

Presenting his mid-term budget review Biti said there was lack of political oneness in Zimbabwe over the implementation and execution of measures necessary for a successful turnaround and transformation of the economy. This, he said, unavoidably entailed pain and sacrifice.

“In this regard, it would be an indictment on our collective political leadership that, two and a half years into the inclusive government, we are not yet on a development platform where our internal systems automatically seize on all arising opportunities, critical to leap-frogging to levels consistent with the potential of our economic and social transformation in the region,” he said.

Zimbabwe has been rated as one of the countries in Southern Africa with the greatest potential for growth. It has abundant natural resources and the highest literacy rate in Africa.

The country’s economy is expected to grow by 9.3 percent this year but Biti said this could have reached double digits if there was an agreed national vision on the way forward.

The two major political parties to the inclusive government, the Movement for Democratic Change and the Zimbabwe African national Union-Patriotic Front, hardly agree on anything from the politics to the economy.

Right now they are divided on when elections will be held something that adds to the country risk because elections in Zimbabwe have always been accompanied by violence.

There are also doubts about whether ZANU-PF will accept the people’s verdict, something it turned down in the last elections in 2008 when it embarked on a massive violence campaign in the run up to the presidential elections run-off after its leader Robert Mugabe had lost the first round to MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai.

The parties are also divided on economic policies especially on indigenisation. ZANU-PF insists that 51 percent of all foreign-owned investments must be sold to locals. The MDC argues that the policy is not transparent and is likely to benefit ZANU-PF cronies only.

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