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Tendai Moyo
After the new Zanu-PF Cabinet was picked and announced, some pessimists with unconcealed connections to the country’s detractors were quick to dismiss it using irreverent superlatives designed to corrode the people’s confidence in the new team of ministers.
Some called it a “collection of deadwood” while others condemned it as a group of “recycled underperformers”. Whatever they called it, it became apparent that the backlash was a sheer case of sour grapes.
All the name-calling and mudslinging came from a wounded political outfit and its similarly bruised acolytes who could not accept the phenomenal electoral mandate freely handed to Zanu-PF by Zimbabweans. All the vitriol was aimed at discrediting the new Government.
However, developments on the ground are set to disabuse the doomsday claims of the MDC-T. Already the new Zanu-PF Government has hit the ground running. President Mugabe hit the right chord by setting a developmental agenda.
In all his speeches, the President has declared that his Government would revive dormant industries and resuscitate the deplorable social service delivery infrastructure in urban areas.
The President pledged to support agriculture and fight corruption. He also promised to conclude the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Programme and create more employment.
The new government has set the ball rolling and is digging deep into its Look East bag to deliver. On the social service delivery front, plans to rehabilitate the antiquated City of Harare water treatment plant long neglected by successive MDC-T councils have been kick-started with the Chinese technical team already in Harare.
Zimbabwe awarded a US$144 million contract to China Machinery Equipment Company (CMEC) to upgrade Harare’s water works, build three dams and set up a new water treatment plant. The interventions would significantly improve the critical water supply situation in the city and alleviate the recurrent sewage pipe blockages. The technical arrangement would be replicated in other towns to militate against similar challenges.
The unrelenting power shortages would become a thing of the past as the new Government has courted Chinese companies to rehabilitate present power-generation establishments and build new ones.
China Africa Sunlight Energy has tendered plans to invest up to US$2,1 billion on coal mines and a thermal power plant that would add 640MW to the national grid. China’s Sinohydro and CMEC have also won tenders to expand Zimbabwe’s two main power plants, Kariba and Hwange. All these efforts would significantly raise the country’s power-generation capacity and exorcise the impoverishing ghost of load shedding.
More so, Government has lined up programmes to resuscitate the agricultural sector. Plans have been set in motion to secure funds to bankroll the country’s agricultural activities. The Minister of Finance, Patrick Chinamasa, has engaged the African Development Bank with proposals for the bank to provide expertise on how the country could mortgage its ubiquitous mineral resources to finance its agricultural and industrial sectors while at the same time servicing its international debt obligations.
Government would also move in to deal with the staggering demands for residential homes by urban dwellers. A Chinese firm, Henan Guoji, has been contracted to build 10 000 houses for low-income earners. This comes against a backdrop of endemic corruption by MDC-T councillors, who for decades have corruptly allocated stands and selfishly grabbed more urban land for speculative purposes.
Genuine home-seekers had to pay through the noses to secure a residential home.
Other deals that the Government had lined up include a US$10 billion petroleum refinery by Baoda Petroleum Company and the establishment of car assembly plant by the Chinese carmaker Hawtei. All these developmental projects would markedly grow the economy and create huge employment opportunities for the people.
In addition to these developmental initiatives, President Mugabe has vowed to piously fight the scourge of corruption. Corruption had drastically contributed to the underperformance of the economy and it should be eradicated.
Efforts to clamp down on corruption would be bolstered by the imminent establishment of the National Prosecuting Authority that would spearhead the fight against crimes. The elimination of corruption would restore efficiency to all government departments and would enable people to easily process their driver’s licences, passports and pass roadblocks without having to pay bribes.
To cap it all, Government has cancelled all outstanding debts owed by residents to councils and to the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority.
Furthermore, it promised to increase salaries of civil servants and introduce non-monetary benefits that would improve their way of life.
It is clear from the aforementioned developments that Government is poised to fulfil all its promises to the people.
No amount of vilification would therefore wipe away the positive efforts being made by the new Zanu-PF Government to grow the economy and uplift people’s lives.
Online Reporter