Opinion / Columnist
A response to Wilbert Mukori by Musewe
13 Oct 2015 at 12:09hrs | Views
"See ye first the political freedom and everything else shall be added unto you" is a myth, a monumental lie, a delusion that assumes political power will necessarily result in economic freedom and development. That will not happen until we re-imagineer what we can be.
Kwame Nkrumah's delusion has not worked in any country in Africa because we forgot to change the economic systems and prolonged and entrenched colonial systems which are based on extractive primary industry and exclusive political and economic institutions.
In addition, we gobbled up billions of "loans" expecting the IMF to save our economies. We are now going back to them to forgive our debt expecting that all will be well forgetting that we remain shackled in their paradigm of Africa and its place in global geopolitics.
The simple reason being that Africans, despite all the knowledge they may have acquired, and in the case of Zimbabwe, despite the high levels of the educated and skilled, have failed to come up with our own economic models that are based of self-reliance and the application of our knowledge to produce or manufacture the goods and services which we consume.
Development is not about politics and economics; it is about packaging knowledge and applying it to improve the quality of life for all. That is where we have failed and that is where we will fail if we think that change of government in Zimbabwe will automatically result in economic and social development.
It is my prediction that whoever might take over from ZANU (PF) will find themselves faced with exactly the same challenges of a global economic model that is moribund and needs fundament re think and re-engineering. That is the point I am making which Mukori either chooses to ignore or fails to comprehend.
In my opinion, it is that conversation that we must have now despite the politics. That is to say beyond political change will be the need to reinvent and reengineer Zimbabwe.
As regards Mukori's assertions that I have chosen to operate within the confines set by the ZANU (PF) paradigm- that is a figment of his creative imagination. Nothing can be further from the truth!
That is the easy path of responding to the honest fact that the continuous bashing of ZANU (PF) in opinion pieces has produced nothing at all. It is to me energy being wasted but that hardly means I condone them. Mukori himself knows that if anyone has done what he can from where he is, it is my consistent rejection of the ZANU (PF) kleptocracy and its ideas face to face with them here in Harare.
Zimbabwe can be a trillion dollar economy in 30 years with full employment. Our conversations and energies must rather be on how we can make that happen because it is possible. That to me is hardly defending a dictatorship whose demise shall soon be with us.
Vince Musewe is an economist and author based in Harare. You may contact him on vtmusewe@gmail.com
Kwame Nkrumah's delusion has not worked in any country in Africa because we forgot to change the economic systems and prolonged and entrenched colonial systems which are based on extractive primary industry and exclusive political and economic institutions.
In addition, we gobbled up billions of "loans" expecting the IMF to save our economies. We are now going back to them to forgive our debt expecting that all will be well forgetting that we remain shackled in their paradigm of Africa and its place in global geopolitics.
The simple reason being that Africans, despite all the knowledge they may have acquired, and in the case of Zimbabwe, despite the high levels of the educated and skilled, have failed to come up with our own economic models that are based of self-reliance and the application of our knowledge to produce or manufacture the goods and services which we consume.
Development is not about politics and economics; it is about packaging knowledge and applying it to improve the quality of life for all. That is where we have failed and that is where we will fail if we think that change of government in Zimbabwe will automatically result in economic and social development.
It is my prediction that whoever might take over from ZANU (PF) will find themselves faced with exactly the same challenges of a global economic model that is moribund and needs fundament re think and re-engineering. That is the point I am making which Mukori either chooses to ignore or fails to comprehend.
In my opinion, it is that conversation that we must have now despite the politics. That is to say beyond political change will be the need to reinvent and reengineer Zimbabwe.
As regards Mukori's assertions that I have chosen to operate within the confines set by the ZANU (PF) paradigm- that is a figment of his creative imagination. Nothing can be further from the truth!
That is the easy path of responding to the honest fact that the continuous bashing of ZANU (PF) in opinion pieces has produced nothing at all. It is to me energy being wasted but that hardly means I condone them. Mukori himself knows that if anyone has done what he can from where he is, it is my consistent rejection of the ZANU (PF) kleptocracy and its ideas face to face with them here in Harare.
Zimbabwe can be a trillion dollar economy in 30 years with full employment. Our conversations and energies must rather be on how we can make that happen because it is possible. That to me is hardly defending a dictatorship whose demise shall soon be with us.
Vince Musewe is an economist and author based in Harare. You may contact him on vtmusewe@gmail.com
Source - Vince Musewe
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