Dilapidated Harare buildings resemble post war Monrovia

The Hallmark of a war torn city is that of filthiness, disorder and utter chaos ,such characteristics are all present in the city of Harare.

The irony is that Zimbabwe was last involved in an armed struggle more than 37 years ago ending after the Lanchester negotiations break through.

The People's Democratic Party views the current status of the cities especially Harare as a serious indictment on the leadership of Mugabe, Saviour Kasukuwere and the entire ZANUPF leadership.

A walk down Fourth Street or any other street in the city for that matter reflects a post war Monrovia, Freetown or Kinshasa when we have not had a war in close to four decades.

As we said recently the failure to respond to the chaos is a result of the broken politics of Jongwe and Munhumutapa buildings.

It is only a sick government which continues with the business  as usual gesture when families slide into poverty and citizens including veterans sleep on the street.

Part of the cause of chaos in the city is abject poverty that ZANUPF has created amongst our people and selfishly so.

ZANUPF has presided over massive de-industrialisation which has seen most of our people turning to venting for survival. Chinamasa even boasted of the in formalisation as a game changer much to the shock of the entire universe.

Our party is aware that ZANUPF benefits from its own mediocrity; they extort the poor vendors and commuter operators through cartels who pay homage to the ZANUPF fourth street base. The money is used to oppress the masses though the funding of repressive apparatus, militia and vigilante groups like Chipangano.

We are concerned by the chaos in the city which includes the running battles between the municipal police and vendors.The Zimbabwe Republic Police has also played cat and mouse with the Kombis, a couple of lives have been lost in the process.

The PDP is of the view that a caring state will ensure that there is a deliberate plan to ensure creation of decent jobs and get people out of the street.

Government must aim at ending the chaos, focus must be on rebuilding the sunshine status of Harare and more importantly creating a 21st century mega city ready to compete with the rest of the world.

To reverse the current confusion in the cities careful holistic strategies need to be employed:

1. Create a stimulus package to provide funds for the resuscitation of closed or distressed companies. The fund in the form of ZERF mentioned in HOPE must provide long term cheap lines of credit to ensure that old companies are revived and new companies created.
2. Old industrial funds created during the GNU such as Dimaf and ZETREV should be revived and recapitalised.
3. Urgent attention should be paid to SMEs, recapitalization of SEDCO and other instruments of credit to Small to Medium businesses.
4. Converting the country's accumulation model from one based on extraction, to one based on industrialization, value addition and beneficiation
5. Develop an urban transport system including a metro system for Bulawayo and Harare.
6. The defining status quo of modern cities is the development of a fast, environmentally clean, urban commuter network commonly known as the Tube or the Metro.
7. The PDP suggests a modern metro- system for all its major cities with priority being given to Chitungwiza - Harare - Norton - Ruwa, - Network and the Pumula- Llewellyn - Cement Side  -  Bulawayo - Network.

 
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