Hopewell Chin'ono's Save Our Hospitals initiative good idea but he is offside

I like Hopewell Chin'ono, he is an ambitious young man full of political energy. He is the mastermind of the idea behind the Save Our Hospitals initiative launched in the month of March 2019. He already appointed and anointed a team of professionals to implement the project. The anointed ones are Beatrice Mtetwa, Bhishop Gandiya, Charles Mazhude, Ben Munyenyiwa, Dixon Chibanda, Pindie Nyandoro, Donald Mutangadura and Solomon Guramatunhu.  They are planning to start with five hospitals namely Parirenyatwa, Harare, Chitungwiza, Mpilo and United Bulawayo hospitals.

The purpose of this piece is to advice Chin'ono and team the dilemma and pitfalls that they are going to face and could possibly lead to the immediate collapse of the project. I want the team to note that, this project is political in nature. The owner of these hospitals is the ZANU PF government and ED Mnangagwa may not take it lightly just watch the space. We are going to be told that Chin'ono is now pushing for regime change. If the project is going to be successful, that would be a direct citizen coup against ZANU PF government.

I was shocked to note that, Chin'ono set a project team before getting approval from the government. He said that the team will meet the minister of health before moving forward. What about if the minister refuses the arrangement? The minister may prefer to use existing structures in these hospitals rather than the Mtetwa team. The inclusion of Mtetwa and Munyenyiwa is likely to make up or break up the project. These people are not ZANU PF friendly and I urge Chin'ono to be very careful. How can he appoint a team before getting a green light from the owner of hospitals? The move is not different from the one who buys his/her coffin like Zodwa before dying. Chin'ono and team should mark my words.

The other challenge is on the selection of the targeted 5 hospital which are all located in only 3 cities of Zimbabwe. Chin'ono should know that more than 70% of Zimbabweans are rural residents and are the most affected. They survive on herbs and cannot even able to pay RTGS$1 in order for them to get medication.  They should include some rural clinics and hospitals because those in diaspora have more relatives in rural areas than urban. The sponsors may refuse to contribute because the distribution of hospitals are subjective. How can they select two hospitals in Harare and Bulawayo each while other cities are neglected? It was better if a hospital was selected from each province/city/district.

Who selected the committee members? It should Chin'ono alone. This will make the project to appear personal rather than (chinhu chedu). Chin'ono should not behave like a dictator ED Mnangagwa who appointed the so called elders from the blues. The speed of appointment and anointment was a suspect. The process could have been democratic. This kind of dictatorship is not accepted. The team leader should learn to be democratic.

My suggestion to Hopewell Chin'ono and team is that, they should only look for hospital drugs mainly from diaspora and supply them through the ministry of health to all Zimbabwean hospitals and clinics without segregation. Rural hospitals should be considered first because they have very few private hospitals to assist them and they are the majority who are more disadvantaged.  Hopewell Chin'ono should respect and work with the government in order to avoid confrontations. His idea is good but he needs specialists that can help him in planning otherwise his plan is shallow for now.

Join me in requesting ED Mnangagwa to appoint and anoint Hopewell Chin'ono to be the minister or deputy minister of health. For now, we should call for the resignation of the minister of health, he doesn't know what he is doing. He is another Mamvura.

Don Chigumba can be found on twitter @Donchigumba