Opinion / Columnist
Zapu Bulawayo Province On ZITF and Bulawayo's economy
25 Apr 2016 at 12:10hrs | Views
The annual Zimbabwe International Trade Fair to be held here in Bulawayo now brings painful memories of a once thriving economy that made young people dream and see economic visions. Parents would bring their children from all corners of the country to show them the country's ability, capacity and potential.
All this happened here in our city: Bulawayo, the City of Kings and Queens. The event was indeed a giant economic gesture, a massive show case, and to put it in simple words, a display of what our industry as a whole was producing be it in agriculture, in the manufacturing sector or in the commercial sector. Today in 2016 the story is different.
The Sunday News of the 24 April 2016 publishes a market report saying "Once again Bulawayo hosts the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair with hope that it can once more re-ignite business interest in the country". Only a hope indeed or rather a wish but precisely just one of the many hallucinations because realistically under the prevailing political conditions there is certainly no hope. The truth is that any economic hope goes with the correct politics in a country. Economic hopes thrive from democratic conditions.
A country that has armed political "stockholders" in which there are state sponsored gross and primitive human rights violations such as kidnappings and subsequent killings of opposition members can only hope, wish and hallucinate about re-igniting an economy. There is no military target in economics. It cannot go farther than that because there are no military targets in the economy. A country that has a seriously polarized press that deliberately ignores or twists facts to prop up unpopular political gurus can never move even an inch to re-ignite an economy.
Zapu's Bulawayo Province urges the people of Bulawayo to thrive to bring about a political climate that will not only give a "hope to re-ignite the economy" but one that will usher in genuine freedom, democracy and human rights for everyone. Bulawayo needs politics that will rekindle investor confidence. Our economy will be re-ignited if our very skilled young people forced to massively abandon the country by the current politics begin to see hope and come back to use those skills to re-build our industries.
by Mkhululi Zulu (Information and Publicity Secretary Zapu Bulawayo Province)
All this happened here in our city: Bulawayo, the City of Kings and Queens. The event was indeed a giant economic gesture, a massive show case, and to put it in simple words, a display of what our industry as a whole was producing be it in agriculture, in the manufacturing sector or in the commercial sector. Today in 2016 the story is different.
The Sunday News of the 24 April 2016 publishes a market report saying "Once again Bulawayo hosts the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair with hope that it can once more re-ignite business interest in the country". Only a hope indeed or rather a wish but precisely just one of the many hallucinations because realistically under the prevailing political conditions there is certainly no hope. The truth is that any economic hope goes with the correct politics in a country. Economic hopes thrive from democratic conditions.
A country that has armed political "stockholders" in which there are state sponsored gross and primitive human rights violations such as kidnappings and subsequent killings of opposition members can only hope, wish and hallucinate about re-igniting an economy. There is no military target in economics. It cannot go farther than that because there are no military targets in the economy. A country that has a seriously polarized press that deliberately ignores or twists facts to prop up unpopular political gurus can never move even an inch to re-ignite an economy.
Zapu's Bulawayo Province urges the people of Bulawayo to thrive to bring about a political climate that will not only give a "hope to re-ignite the economy" but one that will usher in genuine freedom, democracy and human rights for everyone. Bulawayo needs politics that will rekindle investor confidence. Our economy will be re-ignited if our very skilled young people forced to massively abandon the country by the current politics begin to see hope and come back to use those skills to re-build our industries.
by Mkhululi Zulu (Information and Publicity Secretary Zapu Bulawayo Province)
Source - Mkhululi Zulu
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