peterVincent Gono, Features Editor
IT was on Tuesday, December 22, 1987 when news of California actress and film director Alice Frances Taaffe professionally known as Alice Terry’s death filtered through in the United States of America. Terry died at the ripe age of 87.
In Britain they were also mourning the demise of professional award-winning golfer, Thomas Henry Cotton who died at the mature age of 80 years, while in Athens, Greece, the famous composer and conductor Leonidas Zoras had breathed his last at the age of 82.
These famous deaths occurred at the time they were supposed to occur. For who would begrudge death for taking someone who had lived eight full decades and more.
The deaths are well-known, even recorded and remembered, for they occurred in the world’s historical powerhouses in three of the five continents that form the habitable geography of planet earth.
Terry was American, Cotton was European and Zoras was Greek (Asia).
The coincidence is just that they occurred on the same day — December 22, 1987.
On that same Tuesday in the last month of the year of 1987 something was happening in a teapot landlocked country of southern Africa.
A milestone achievement in the history of the country Zimbabwe was made on that Tuesday, December 22, 1987.
The two parties that had fought colonialism side by side driven by the spirit of nationalism decided that Zimbabwe was bigger than power struggles, positions and everything that had separated them and formed a united party Zanu-PF.
The causes of the conflicts that became known as Gukurahundi is not the import of this article but beyond the tribal façade and misleading notion that it was Shona-Ndebele war, historical facts show that it was a conflict between Western and Eastern Europe over the control of the mineral rich country between Zambezi and Limpopo — Zimbabwe.
For how else could one explain that the two sides had suddenly become sworn enemies when they had fought and defeated colonial domination.
Mindful of what they had fought for, the leaders of Zapu and Zanu, the late Dr Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo and the late Cde Robert Gabriel Mugabe realised that a compromise could only save the young sovereign nation from plunging into anarchy and justify to the whole world that it had made a mistake by allowing blacks to rule themselves.
The two historical giants therefore decided to make bold steps.
They sacrificed a lot of personal interests for the benefit of the country and that fact alone deserves their recognition.
Despite Dr Nkomo having birthed and synthesised politics of nationalism in the country as aptly shown by his Father Zimbabwe moniker at death, he agreed to unite and work together with Cde Mugabe for the growth and development of the country.
The two figures are the ones that gave Zimbabweans the vision of a united Zimbabwe that celebrates cultural diversity in a spirit of black Africanism.
That unity has been preached since then with calls by President Mnangagwa for it to remain intact as it is the one that makes Zimbabwe stand and efforts to thwart the unity and divide the people has always been discouraged.
The Unity Day therefore, heralded a new Zimbabwe. A new beginning and a dawn of a new era and it has remained for the past 34 years.
United towards Vision 2030
The theme for this year’s Unity Day celebrations is ‘‘United towards vision 2030’’ and perhaps one may want to know what vision 2030 entails.
The Second Republic under President Mnangagwa has a vision of achieving an upper-middle class economy for Zimbabwe by 2030.
Economic blueprints have therefore been put in place to anchor the vision and they have been followed and implemented with detailed discipline.
First it was the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) and then came the National Development Strategy 1 (NDS1).
These economic blueprints spell out the course and charter the direction that the government will follow to achieve the ultimate goal of a middle-income economy by 2030.
Some of the goals have already been achieved while some are long term and are in line to be met.
Of importance however, to point out here and now is that when the Second Republic was born, Zimbabwe was a melting pot of divisive politics and was cut out from the rest of the world.
It was in isolation and was stubbornly refusing efforts to re-engage with the international community although things were evidently not well.
Domestically, things were like that too.
Unity was preached but no action was there to convince people that there was sincerity in the call for unity.
An atmosphere of fear has been created and was perpetuated where people could not freely talk about emotive episodes such as Gukurahundi.
But when the Second Republic came into existence it opened up platforms for engagement both locally, regionally and internationally.
Locally, the process of healing was initiated and emotions were let out.
This was done to ensure no one is left socially and politically grieved as the development train trudges towards Vision 2023.
Economically, Vision 2023 is anchored on three key pillars, namely industrialisation, competitiveness and regional integration.
The idea is to turn the country from an exporter of minerals and primary products to a key global net exporter of processed goods by creating value chains locally across sectors, but also across borders while upgrading existing and developing new infrastructures and expedite the creation of significant jobs and trade opportunities locally and within the region.
It is also built on the realisation that Africa’s lack of industrialisation is not about the lack of resources, but about the lack of vision and political will to do what is necessary, corruption and the greed for power without responsibility.
Vision 2030 which seeks to create an upper middle-income economy with a $65 billion GDP can therefore only be realised through a rapid industrialisation strategy that takes away the country from a low-income primary production to high income value addition and beneficiation as stated both by President Mnangagwa and Minister of Finance and Economic Development Professor Mthuli Ncube.
The idea of industrialisation has started taking shape with key infrastructure being put in place such as revamping of the country’s road network for easy trafficability and the construction of dams for sustainable irrigation to ensure food security.
It is with that background that more is done on the ground to achieve unity of purpose as the country moves in the direction of Vision 2023.
Online Reporter