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Gibson Nyikadzino-Correspondent
Last week, two events on Zimbabwe’s calendar presented the nation with the opportunity to test their resilience and endurance to withstand the colonial and post-colonial pressures.
The Heroes Day and Defence Forces Day holidays are exceptional days that exhibit the prowess of Zimbabweans in fighting and winning against colonialism and also an opportunity to express the annihilation of neo-colonial overtures of many who want to transfer the victory of the masses to the former colonisers.
With land and resource ownership, Zimbabwe is a beacon and torch bearer setting an example that both political and economic independence are key indicators in institutional development and forging of relations with other states.
In African countries where land or the means of production remain in the hands of the white minority because of colonial links, citizens of those states will never understand the full meaning of independence and what the right to self-determination entails, no matter how much they will gloss about their full bellies.
The fear of economic reprisals from the West by other African states shown in their failure to initiate people-based agrarian or agricultural reforms through repossessing land and redistributing it equally among all citizens is the reason the picture of Africa’s total emancipation is highly pixelated.
The “who feeds you controls you” phrase is an eye-opener towards the practical steps to decoloniality; socially, politically and above all, economically.
Talk of interdependence and political freedom should also be measurable by efforts to redistribute wealth to the benefit of the majority.
This also determines how African countries also relate with each other.
It should be noted that Zimbabwe has remained resolute with positive implications in pursuing its foreign policy goals of non-interference and promoting national sovereignty and equality among nations.
Foreign policies of most African countries have remained highly dependent on the direction offered by the former colonial master many years after independence.
While development has largely followed the dictated and biased Western forms, most African countries have found it difficult to wean themselves from their dependence on the expectations of the colonial power.
In terms of socio-cultural, economic and political development, the deconstruction of African values through alien values has affected the potential of many African countries to be independent in the manner they approach the arrangement of their socio-economic and political order.
For a long time, the concept of development has mainly been discussed while overlooking the efforts of African civilisations in pursuit of the Western models over local ones.
The architecture of local institutions has remained prominent because of footprints of the inherited Western colonial heritage.
Modernisation theorists have continuously impressed on the idea that the best form of development is one that has been introduced to Africa from Western capitals.
The form of development introduced by the former colonisers on many occasions has influenced the foreign policies of most post-colonial African states.
This has in many ways made the aspect of development a “one-sided affair” that gives prominence to views of the alien colonial powers.
It has taken development off the equity scale, leaving some African countries failing to craft their own development trajectory.
But for Zimbabwe, gratefully, it has in its foreign policy deconstructed the Western knowledge body of “what is Western is always right” by shaping and reshaping its foreign policy and influencing how the ownership of the means of production should be placed in the hands of the black majority.
The country has managed to put back development on the global agenda through advancement of the importance of economic sovereignty by breathing inspiration into the reinforcement of strong south-to-south alliances and partnerships in initiatives of development.
Zimbabwe’s National Development Strategy (NDS1), as a short-term economic blueprint that will influence the long term plans for Zimbabwe, has some key take-aways that can be equated to other policies of friendly nations like.
After Zimbabwe launched the NDS1 (2021-2025) last January, in March last year China launched its 14th Five Year Development Plan.
The contents from the two policy documents signify the need for a complete overhaul on the tone of global development.
On the international stage, the NDS1 is motivated by re-engagement, the need to balance external shocks, recapitalisation and integration into the world economy to ensure a win-win and mutual cooperation without being prejudiced by the proposals of the bigger states.
The ‘Zimbabwe is Open for Business’ drive also best serves to explain the openness of the country to international markets, as well as the advocacy for the integration of economies.
At a foreign policy level, contents in the NDS 1 have remained pro-poor and are concerned with addressing issues of poverty and underdevelopment by giving poor people a voice in shaping social and internal development policies.
This has created a people-centred development paradigm.
From China’s 14th Five Year Plan, its importance has been in outlining and discussing the dimensions of international political economy in establishing the nexus or the tension between economics and politics.
Both China and Zimbabwe’s policies, because of the developmental nature, have faced hegemonic hurdles from the US led Western alliance which has been trying to block the reconfiguration of the pro-poor development plans in these two countries.
To the Southern African region, in the case of Zimbabwe, the tension between politics and economics has been evidenced by indications from Western countries, particularly the USA that it would punish African countries that want to embark on land redistribution.
For China, Western countries have also been smearing its investments in the mining sector in Zimbabwe.
This is so because China and Zimbabwe have common approaches to what constitutes people-oriented development through their pledge to raise as voice of decolonisation and inclusivity in international fora.
Thus, in this revisionist idea of what should constitute development, south-to-south co-operation should, therefore, strive, through independent foreign policies, to establish multilateral partnerships that vigorously reshape the global agenda by incorporating development issues.
In this case, fairer development practices when states engage rely heavily on the strengthening of multilateralism despite that no guarantees will come that those opposed to Zimbabwe’s foreign policy will respect these multilateral moves and their outcomes.
This developmental foreign policy thrust by Zimbabwe should be a template used to reflect making a coherent case for Africa’s developmental agenda where nations are able to have their people own the means of production and reintroduce in their countries new requirements of development onto the global agenda.
Online Reporter