War vets: Time to tackle socio-economic exclusion

Keith Guzah Special Correspondent—

“Nyika ino takaitora nehondo. Inyika yeropa. Varwi verusununguko vakawanda vakafira nyika ino…” (We liberated this country through the barrel of a gun. Blood was shed for this country. There are a lot of people who laid their lives this country’s independence).These are salutary words made by President Mugabe on the many occasions when the country marks Independence and Defence Forces days, with the Head of State and Government giving tribute to the sacrifices that Zimbabwe’s gallant sons and daughters made for our liberation.

Today, there are an estimated 34 000- strong surviving liberation war veterans who braved the harsh guerrilla warfare that brought about an independent Zimbabwe in 1980.

Things are not looking good for war veterans and their families and this is a subject that has lately taken centre stage.

War veterans stare gloomily at their children’s bleak and wretched conditions as they ponder on how to survive today in a country that they sacrificed literally everything for.

For good measure, their dreams and hopes have been immensely shattered in the face of socio-economic exclusion.

While they witnessed the pomp and fanfare that characterised the two most important and significant historical markers underlining peace in the country as a basis for prosperity – the flag independence that came about on April 18 1980 when the British Union Jack was replaced by the hoisting of our own national flag; and the Unity Accord of December 22 1987 that ended internal strife between Zanu (PF) and PF Zapu – our war veterans are yet to enjoy any meaningful empowerment programmes initiated by government.

That is even with the advent of the Agrarian Reform and the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment programmes which had the lofty ideals of economically empowering the majority in furtherance of political independence.

Financial institutions have systematically excluded the war veterans and withheld support because of their failure to produce collateral for loans, thus rendering them ineffective in their bid to participate in the mainstream economy. As such, they continue wallowing in abject and unmitigated poverty.

War veterans’ affairs should not be taken for granted or become the subjec of lip service.

The principal tenet of the War Veterans’ Act (Chapter 11;15) is to “provide for the establishment of ‘schemes’ for the provision of assistance to war veterans and their dependants; to provide for the establishment of a fund to ‘finance’ such assistance.” In South Africa, War Veterans are under the Ministry of Defence and Military Veterans. Section 24 (1) of the Military Veterans Act 2011 (Act No. 18 of 2011) subsection 5 (10) stipulates that

1. The minister must establish a business vehicle through which business opportunities can be pursued by the state on behalf of the military veterans.

11. The facilitation of business opportunities entails programmes from the department which may include:

a) Training on business information and statistics in various sectors

b) Training on planning, logistics and financial modelling,

c) Information on funding options and institutional arrangements

d) Linkages to markets

e) Skills transfer, capacity building, support and mentorship.

In essence, this model allows for a smooth social integration of our war veterans in the mainstream of the economy by placing the commanding heights of the economy squarely on their laps.

Against this background, the ministry must, therefore, engage Government and private sector partners and fight for the financial inclusion of this intrinsic part of our community. And until such time that Government, through the Ministry of War Veterans’ Welfare places more emphasis (practically) on sourcing funding for the establishment of a well structured revolving finance package and a consistent programme of training them on how to start and maintain successful businesses, cooperatives and joint ventures to augment their meagre pensions, the status quo will remain, albeit with negative consequences.

It is, however, encouraging to hear from the Head of State and Government that plans are in the offing to hand over two mining concerns to the war veterans