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Cliford Shambare
Many Zimbabweans today are coy to exhibit, or even listen to what may seem to be an extreme position where the Zimbabwean economy is concerned, and so they avoid calling a spade a spade.
It is my hope that the views I am expressing in this article are not going to be regarded as such by those who read it and happen to feel differently about the matters under discussion. And it is not an exaggeration to assert that in Zimbabwe today, in quite a few cases, it becomes more about how one feels about a situation rather than what they see and think about it.
It has always been said that in order to shame the devil, you need to tell the truth about whatever harm he is causing to your life. This is what Zimbabweans need to do today.
Although most people seem to be unable or unwilling, to see or admit the fact, the whites who comprised the colonists in this country, owned [and still ironically own] and ran this economy quite well. However, I am not implying that colonialism was a good thing per se. It is also not my wish to dwell on the politics of this country in this article, nor to show my political leaning, but I am just analysing the situation as it has been, and still stands.
So what is my objective for writing this piece, you may be wondering? Here it is: you see, it takes a long time to develop and to grow an economy to a prosperous state.
So it does not make sense to build one and then abandon it for any reason whatsoever. In the developed countries they do not abandon their economies. In the emerging ones, although they are conscious of the need to acquire or borrow the means to grow their own economies, they try very hard to maintain an economically meaningful contact with the home country, if ever and whenever, they do so.
Zimbabwe and South Africa are two African countries in which the British meant to settle for ever. So everything they set up there, the economy and all, was meant to last; so is the case with this country’s white population today. Although on the surface, a relatively much higher proportion of them left the country than the one that remained, this is not exactly the case.
But why make such an apparently preposterous assertion? It is all to do with the makeup of capitalism whose base is land, otherwise known as property, in that scheme of things.
In Zimbabwe the whites lost a good part of ‘their’ land after the Land Reform Programme was implemented. This land was mostly rural (farm) land but in the towns they remained with the whole capital base-that is land, buildings, machinery and all. They still hold title to it.
Because of the high stakes involved, from that point on, they decided to wait for conditions to improve in the country, and the subsequent exit of Robert Mugabe from office availed them with that opportunity. But because they were not sure that Mnangagwa wished to completely change Mugabe’s course on the economic front, they waited for their doubts to be cleared first before they could make their final decision either to completely abandon that economy, or to stay on. His mantra of being “open for business” gave them some hope but not complete assurance on the matter.
It is in this mode that they now are, and so they are making efforts to encourage their erstwhile compatriots in the game of economic sabotage to adopt a more positive attitude to the situation.
This assertion is borne out by Eddie Cross’ current efforts. To add to his efforts, when on April 4, 2019, Jeremy Yeomans, the Chairman of Zimbabwe Spinners Association, was invited by the ZBC/TV to discuss the challenges that his industry was facing, he said the current perception of an economic meltdown in the country was not helping their cause.
So what we learn from these two cases is that the whites have decided that this is an opportunity that has presented itself for them to resuscitate “their” economy but then, there is now a myriad of challenges that is confronting them.
One of these challenges has to do with the economic sanctions that US imposed on Zimbabwe in 2001. Although it may appear to be new under the current circumstances, this is an old but latent challenge that was sure to rear its ugly head sooner or later.
This challenge arises from the miscalculations that these former Rhodesians made regarding the matter; when they requested for economic sanctions from the USA, they seem to have neither worked out nor planned how these sanctions were to be terminated.
Nor had they tried to predict how the situation would play out on its way to some end. Since they hoped to restart the economy at some point in future, subsequent termination of these sanctions would have to be the logical end to the case.
But now, the US political system does not allow such processes as the termination of economic sanctions imposed on any state, to be effected that easily.
And besides, we know that some Zimbabweans are manipulating the situation to suit their objectives — objectives that are not of any good to the country and economy but paradoxically, to those of the US itself. In a way, the US regards this case as a blessing in disguise. “Dzauya dzega” as a Shona adage goes.
So the current challenge for the former group is more to do with the synchronisation of US foreign policy on sanctions and the events that are unfolding in Zimbabwe on the politico-economic arena, than to do with finding a purely economic solution.
And finding simple economic solutions in such a complex environment as the current one, with its latent claims from various quarters — claims that are sometimes conflicting — is a tall order in itself. This situation presents this white population’s business fraternity with a serious challenge today.
Then there is the challenge that comes from the private media and the concomitant psyche that is now prevalent among their journalists who have been subtly conditioned to think in a certain way, in the process adopting a certain position. Its current attitude is to trash or attack anyone who may appear to suggest that there are any signs of improvement in the economy. And although he does not want to come out clearly and directly on the matter, this is the attitude that Yeomans is referring to in his interview.
Since this attitude has been developed over a period of 22 years, it will take a long time if at all, to erase (it). But even then, the situation is more complex than meets the eye. First of all, the capacity of “new” black executives who took over the economy after the whites left, to run it effectively, is still doubtful to say the least. They have failed in that period, to resuscitate it, even though they have often found it easy to just heap all the blame on Mugabe for “wantonly destroying the economy”. (This is part of the matter that forms its own complete story — a story that needs to be told on another day.)
This situation is exacerbated by the activities of those external forces that are subtly working tirelessly to derail the economy; in this context, they are using someone else to do their bidding, in the process paying him to maintain pressure on the current system until their objectives are met.
Paradoxically, this is a situation that creates a serious dilemma for some of the originators of this strategy who have now lost a good part of [its] control to the politicians who themselves, are now using it for their own ends — ends that are not congruent with the recovery of the economy.
To make matters even worse, these politicians have somehow managed to instil their thinking into the minds of a substantial proportion of Zimbabweans, some of whom have now become their staunch supporters while the others are just being opportunistic. They have achieved this state through a cleverly contrived brainwashing and (sustained) campaign strategy. And remember, there are black people in this country, who never liked the idea of black rule, so they did and still do not, need much persuading to turn against the black government.
At this stage you may be thinking; but most of these people are now dead or too old, or too few to make any meaningful contribution to the decisions of the electorate. However, the actual reality on the ground is not as simple and straight forward as it may seem here.
The other day I was talking about such people with someone who had been directly involved in the war of liberation, who said something I shall never forget. He said; “In our culture, people inherit a lot from their parents, grandparents and great grandparents, going as far back as their memory can allow them.
So if your father or grandfather, or even your grandmother for that matter, got killed during that war for indulging in unsavoury activities, you and the other members of your family will be told this story with all its biases. And so these reactionary attitudes are very likely to continue through generations, in those families”.
So what you have is a really complex situation where on the one hand, some Zimbabweans are somehow geared into a mindset that, if allowed to have its way, will inadvertently destroy the economy, while on the other hand, the real owners of that economy as articulated in this article, can see some light at the end of the tunnel. They can see that with the coming into the country, of foreign investors, some of whom they have virtually no relationship with, they could lose out in the end.
Today in Zimbabwe, my observations have shown me that it is now quite difficult to convince some people, especially the young ones, that the leadership currently in office can resuscitate this economy. The mantra among them is that this leadership is now too old to change anything, therefore it must quit!
Sometimes these attitudes exhibit a more cynical form, such that it is not unusual to hear young Zimbabweans say; “Ngavachibva timbodyawo”. Personally, I have heard this statement quite a few times from some of them. But they do not seem to realise that that pot needs to be filled by someone first, and that they themselves, could be that someone! This becomes a chicken and egg quandary in itself. As an example of such thinking, I was recently engaged in a conversation with a young black Zimbabwean, a pharmacist by profession, who when I pressed him to give me the reasons for this thinking, said to me.
“We just want bread on the table, that’s all”.
Rather cheesed off by his attitude, I intuitively referred him to Proverbs 6:26 which says: “For because of a prostitute, a man can be reduced to a loaf of bread. But the wife of another man preys on a precious life.”
Still maintaining my self control, I asked him at length; “So you want to sell a whole inheritance that was paid for with blood, for a loaf of bread?” At this stage the young man looked quite confused, apparently, by the level of thinking that I had inadvertently driven him into.
There are no doubt, many young Zimbabweans out there, are in this state of quandary today. They want to meet immediate needs, not long term ones; but most of us know that this is not a sustainable stance for anyone to adopt.
The solution to this challenge is to be found in the politico-economic arena but since I have said I do not wish to express my political views in this article, I shall live the matter for another day.
◆ Clifford Shambare is an agriculturalist-cum- economist and can be contacted on 0774960937.
Bongani Ndlovu