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Scheme Trust (CSOS/T) in Gwanda as the indigenous empowerment programme gathers momentum.
Thousands of people from Matabeleland South Province turned up to witness the momentous occasion, in which 15 mining companies and a cement manufacturer donated $5 million to kick-start the Gwanda community development fund.
The companies also pledged to give 10 percent of their annual profits for community development projects and also ceded 51 percent of their shareholding to indigenous ownership.
The CSOS/T is a countrywide Government initiative spearheading development and empowering rural communities by giving them a 10 percent stake in all businesses that exploit natural resources in their areas.
Speaking at the launch, President Mugabe said the launch was a fulfilment of the aspirations of liberation fighters whose passion was to see the political and economic freedom of Zimbabweans who were down-trodden and marginalised by racist settler colonialists.
However, he said indigenous empowerment was not enough if no one was prepared to defend it against neo-colonialism.
“We are not only re-distributing our country’s wealth and rightfully so, but we seek now to elevate those who were called labourers by the defeated racist system of governance that classified people on the basis of their skin colour. We are removing the unfair and indefensible barriers and limitations, which inhibited the full and unfettered participation of black Zimbabweans in the mainstream economy,” said President Mugabe.
He said the empowerment drive was also designed to control the selfish exploitation of the country’s natural resources by and for the benefit of multi-national corporations and other foreign business entities with negligible returns to Zimbabweans.
The President said the motive behind achieving the 51 percent ownership in companies was neither vindictive nor racist.
“The principle of sovereign ownership of the natural resources of our land by the State on behalf of indigenous Zimbabweans is also a means of fighting and eliminating the dependency syndrome, which has haunted most of the developing world. It is a policy that enables us to think beyond foreign aid, which often has strings attached to it,” said President Mugabe.
He said no one was being demeaned by the programme.
“If anything, we are demeaning ourselves because God gave us 100 percent of our natural resources but here we are saying we are content with 51 percent and others can simply get 49 percent. Colonialism conditioned us to be workers and we always think of looking for jobs, but never of being employers. It is time to be empowered and discard that way of thinking,” he said to applause from the crowd.
President Mugabe warned companies that did not want to take up the generous 51 to 49 percent offer now, saying in future they will go out with nothing.
He said foreigners, especially from Europe, had exploited the country’s natural resources for centuries without developing the country and the time had come for the practice to stop.
“Where they have dug out minerals, they have left gaping pits. Mushrooms, grass or trees may grow back, but minerals have no habit of growing back. If we do not act now, our children will ask us about these pits. They will condemn and blame us saying ah babathathela ngama colonisers. The CSOS/T is a way of ensuring that does not happen,” he said.
President Mugabe said it was incumbent on Zimbabweans to ensure they did not get used by the West to reverse the gains of indigenisation.
He also donated 250 computers to 25 schools in the province. The schools also received two printers each.
President Mugabe also launched the $40 000 Ukondla Fund from which youths in Matabeleland South received money to start income generating projects.
Speaking at the same occasion, the Governor and Resident Minister of the province, Angeline Masuku, said foreign companies used Gwanda’s mineral resources to build big cities abroad while the town remained severely underdeveloped.
She said people from the province were saying those who did not want to comply with indigenisation had their own governments elsewhere and should leave the country.
In a preparatory meeting for the CSOS/T launch last month, Governor Masuku said the $5 million being offered by the companies was too little as the schemes that were launched by Zimplats in Mhondoro, Chegutu and Zvimba in October last year, Unki Mines in Shurugwi and by Mimosa Mine in Zvishavane were all started with a $10 million development fund.
“Yes, they may have been launched by bigger companies, but the companies here, like Vumbachikwe, have been exploiting minerals here even before the time of King Lobengula. The bigger companies have been operating for less than 10 years. So, I say we should also have $10 million to start the fund,” she said.
Among the people who attended the event were traditional leaders from the province, the Minister of Local Government, Rural and Urban Development, Dr Ignatious Chombo, the Minister of Mines and Mining Development, Dr Obert Mpofu, Zanu-PF National Chairman Cde Simon Khaya Moyo, the Minister of Indigenisation, Youth Development and Economic Empowerment, Saviour Kasukuwere, Zanu-PF Matabeleland South chairman Cde Andrew Langa, civil servants and service chiefs.
Online Reporter