Online Reporter
Dr Obert Moses Mpofu
Zimbabwe joined the rest of the world in celebrating Worker’s Day on 1 May, and it is important to remind everyone, particularly the workers, that we have never and will not forsake the plight of our workers.
There is no resource more important than the country’s workers, who toil every day to ensure that their nation is in a better place. For long, workers’ rights and their welfare have been treated with the utmost importance that they deserve by the Zanu-PF-led Government.
Failure to recognise the role of our workers in our nation’s aspirations is equivalent to reckless endangerment of our nation’s future.
All our workers from all sectors of our economy are equally important as they have all, acting in their different spheres, influenced the prosperity of our nation, one way or the other.
It is important to remember that, some of the country’s earliest revolutionaries such as Benjamin Burombo, the earliest labour union leader and black nationalist were workers, and it is them that we owe the spirit of the revolution that tackled the colonial regime.
Without them having sought to fight the oppressive conditions and inhumane treatment they experienced in their daily lives as they toiled to feed their families under a repressive system, then there is no revolution or war of independence to speak of.
Even after attaining our independence, it is the everyday worker who carried the weight of the new nation on their shoulders. With the odds heavily stacked against us, our workers worked the economy and sustained our nation to this very day and these workers continue doing this.
There is so much that the working class has done for our beloved land. Equally the same, our Government has strived to ensure that the contribution of our workers does not go unrecognised. Our policies as a party, which we have sought to implement through government, have always been ones that are central to the plight of the workers. The workers are the engine that drives our nation forward and propels it towards prosperity.
Very few people are aware of the significance of this day in Zimbabwe’s history. It is the workers who are the cornerstone of this nation. Workers have always occupied a special place in our country’s trajectory. This country was built on the sweat and blood of the black worker. It is the hands and toil of the black workers that have always been the engine of this great nation and driven our progression towards prosperity.
From the colonial era, the black worker was exploited for their labour to build this cherished country of ours. Our people have always been hard-working and have never shied away from work. This is why our nation has managed to survive many a storm. Zimbabwean workers are sought all across the world due to their hard-working nature and their ability to deliver. There is no one quite like the Zimbabwean worker. Their resourcefulness is renowned across the world, with many employers having a bias towards the Zimbabwean employee. No nation can prosper without having the right set of individuals who can put in the work towards that particular nation’s aspirations. A nation’s workers define that particular nation and are central to how the nation is perceived and how it will fare economically.
There can be no argument that Zimbabwe has been able to produce a highly skilled and capable type of worker who can thrive in any sector and in any environment. Zimbabwean workers have more or less managed to conquer the world, so to speak.
As the world changes at an exponential rate, our Government has ensured that the most important thing to do is to protect the jobs of our locals. With Artificial Intelligence and technology taking over the world by storm, it has become increasingly important to ensure that we protect the interests of our workers and that they do not lose their jobs and fall victim to these changes that are occurring all around us. We will engineer policies that will seek to ensure that our workers will always have a part to play in our economy at all levels. Our universities have been able to produce world-class graduates who, in turn, have become exactly the kind of worker that is highly sought-after by employers. We owe this to the deliberate polices to train and educate our people that have been introduced by the Zanu-PF Government since independence. As a result, Zimbabwe has thrived from these deliberate policies and has a highly skilled workforce at its disposal. Due to their immense contribution to our great nation, workers will forever hold a special place in our country.
*Dr Obert Moses Mpofu is an academic and the Secretary-General of Zanu-PF. He writes in his own capacity
