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Dr Bongani Ngwenya
Preamble:
PARDON me, this instalment is simply unpacking what I term my beautiful “world view”.
It probably took me to do a PhD in order to have this beautiful “world view”.
A beautiful world view to understand why and appreciate that doing things in a business as usual manner does not work at times. Yes, it is paramount that our leadership observe the national constitution.
However, my acquired and beautiful world view, made me understand the nature of our new President (Emmerson Mnangagwa), when listening to him when he was addressing the mainly Zimbabwean dominant business community in South Africa two weeks ago.
He did not hide his awareness of the politics in his national administration responsibility, but in this beautiful world view he, puts “the economy, the economy, the economy” of the country first.
Now that the President has finally appointed his Vice-Presidents, I hope the politically concerned in my beautiful world view are now happy.
Coming back to my beautiful world view. Quoting Michelle Obama (2017), “the presidency doesn’t change who you are, it reveals who you are”.
When listening to the video, just last week, by the way I have it posted on my Facebook, I said “wow” what an inspiration.
She was talking about her current president, Donald Trump of course.
The presidency doesn’t change who you are, it reveals who you are. In my beautiful world view, I said to myself, thinking about our new President in Zimbabwe, “The President arrives at his office at 8AM daily and ministers yesterday jokingly said they were not used to it.
One remarked; “Aaa vatouya (President Mnangagwa). Hatina kuzvijaira zvekumutswa makuseni akadai isu. (We are not used to waking up so early for work).” As I am writing this article, I am observing this other quotation . . .
“President keeps to work ethics . . . while many workers enjoyed the ‘five-day weekend’ that started with Unity Day, the President was hard at work on Friday and . . .”
“President Emmerson Mnangagwa spent the better part of yesterday at his Munhumutapa offices as he knuckles down to engineering economic turnaround . . .”
“To our civil servants, it cannot be business as usual. You now have to roll up your sleeves in readiness to deliver. We have an economy to recover, a people to serve.
Each and every one of us must now earn their hour, day, week and month at work.”
“Gone are the days of absenteeism and desultory application, days of unduly delaying and forestalling decisions and services in the hope of extorting dirty rewards. That will have to stop.
“A new culture must now inform and animate our daily conduct. Our offices must speedily answer questions and generate solutions awaited by our customers, be they our citizens or well-meaning outsiders who want to join in the recovery of our economy.”
“Flexibility must be built into our operations so the machine of Government does not become one huge, ponderous stumbling block to decisions that must be made and communicated expeditiously.
The culture in Government just has to change, unseating those little ‘gods’ idly sitting in public offices, for a busy, empathetic civil service that Zimbabwe surely deserves.”
In my beautiful world view:
In my beautiful world view, presidency does not change who you are, it reveals who you are. Thanks to Michelle Obama. With the President’s hands on the plough and the army watching on the economic saboteurs, ministers, public servants and the private sector all thinking outside the box and faithful to their respective duties my beautiful world view is so beautiful.
In my beautiful world view the President finds it fit to appoint any senior member of his Cabinet or party to remain acting in his absence, while he goes to South Africa, a sister country in Africa, not only that, a neighbour, not only that, the largest Sadc trading partner that currently host more than a million Zimbabweans, among them are renowned businesspeople and professionals occupying very important positions of business leadership in that country to address them.
I was shocked, not as their President, but as his brothers and sisters. Assuring them that Zimbabwe is now open for investment in all sectors of the economy and that his administration is doing everything possible to create a conducive environment for investors by amending various pieces of legislation starting with the notorious indigenous policy.
In his address of a highly-subscribed business meeting on his maiden foreign assignment here recently, President Mnangagwa said it was no longer business as usual in Zimbabwe.
He appealed to Zimbabweans in the Diaspora to return home and exploit business opportunities presented by the new dispensation.
“Zimbabwe is open for business. Yes, there will be political issues, but primarily its economics and trade for Zimbabwe.
To achieve that, we need to revisit our own legislation in Zimbabwe to open for business,”
The President continued, I quote, “May I say that I am hopeful, my team is hopeful. There is no business as usual. Things have changed. It is a new era.
I am from the military. If it is left turn its left turn, if it is right turn, right turn. My ministers are very clear about that stance.”
In my beautiful world view, “operation restore economy” certainly needs people who understand the military language and way of doing things.
People who can distinguish between a left turn and a right turn and thus respond accordingly. If the left turn is leading us to destruction and probably nowhere, the command is turn right.
In my beautiful world view, the presidency does not change who you are but it reveals who you are.
The President believes that together we can move forward. He made it clear that he is aware of the abundant skills that rest here among our people in the diaspora from Zimbabwe.
His appeal was for Zimbabweans in the diaspora to come to Zimbabwe. Whenever they come, look for the investment opportunities that now present themselves.”
We are almost 16 to 18 years behind others. We do not need to reinvent the wheel.
We need to catch up and overtake them and to do that we the politicians must create an environment where you can survive.”
All this happened in my beautiful world view before the President appointed his deputies, which some people, entitled to their opinions of course, found it a gross violation of the constitution of the country.
The economy, economics and more trade in my beautiful world view takes precedence over other things.
Zimbabwe is more politically stable than ever, that’s why in my beautiful world view the President could easily assign a non-deputy President to remain acting in his absence, while pre-occupying himself with the most important and critical issue-the economy, economics, more trade and more trade.
In conclusion, may I be a bit controversial. While it might have taken me to do a PhD in order to have this beautiful world view, I know a lot of my fellow Zimbabweans are smarter than me, they don’t need to first acquire PhDs in order to appreciate the beauty of my beautiful world view.
By the way some of us do not care who is leading our beautiful country as long as they subscribe to our beautiful world view.
Hands on the plough our President! Happy New Year new Zimbabwe.
There is light at the end of the tunnel. Let’s judge our leadership according to their performance, not according to what they were yesterday. Presidency does not change who you are, it reveals who you are.
-Dr Bongani Ngwenya is based at the University of KwaZulu-Natal as a post-doctoral Research Fellow and can be contacted on [email protected]
Bongani Ndlovu