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Prosper Ndlovu recently in Victoria Falls
THE 2015 national budget priorities have been set and the ball is now in Finance and Economic Development Minister Patrick Chinamasa’s court to draft the implementation document mapping the developmental path for the coming year.Parliamentarians converged in the resort town of Victoria Falls for a three-day seminar that ended on Saturday where they took stock of the economic state of affairs in the country, which revealed the need to do more work towards unlocking the economy.
“Moving towards actualisation of policies meant to promote socio-economic transformation in Zimbabwe”, was the theme of budget consultation that dovetailed the country’s developmental agenda, Zim-Asset.
Senate President Edna Madzongwe summarised the import of the meeting at the end of the deliberations, which was also attended by Cabinet ministers, development agencies representatives and traditional leaders.
“The national budget is a critical implementation tool in our national election as it has the capacity to empower and advance the standard of living for our people.
“Ample evidence has been given to show that the fiscal cake is small, therefore our oversight role is to call for new measures to help grow our revenue base,” said Madzongwe.
“These measures dovetail into the funding requirements for the implementation of the four main clusters of Zim-Asset.”
These clusters include food security and nutrition, value addition and beneficiation, social services and poverty alleviation and infrastructure development.
Top of the agenda during the 2015 pre- budget discussion was the need for prioritised funding of the agriculture sector, which is the country’s backbone of the economy and full utilisation of mineral resources through value addition and beneficiation.
Recapitalisation of the country’s ailing industry, ensuring policy consistency and capacitating small to medium enterprises to play a meaningful role in mainstream economy, were also key topics for the budget.
Madzongwe described the three-day deliberations as “fruitful” and applauded the legislators for playing their role in national governance.
She reminded the gathering of the advice President Mugabe gave to ministers and parliamentarians while officially opening the second session of the Eight Parliament a fortnight ago.
“He (President) reminded us to discharge our mandate in a manner that will not erode the trust conferred upon us by the people of Zimbabwe.
‘‘If we don’t do that people will kick us out come 2018,” she said.
This year’s $4,4 billion budget came under scrutiny during the deliberations amid concerns over the continued liquidity crisis and low revenue collection resulting in inadequate disbursements and suppressed growth.
Online Reporter