Back to Index

This article participates on the following special index pages:

Task force: heads to roll
Njabulo Ncube, Financial Gazette
August 16, 2007

http://allafrica.com/stories/200708170460.html

In an intriguing turn of events to the on-going blitz on prices, the government plans to reconstitute the Cabinet Task Force on Prices by fusing into its ranks moderates and sidelining hardliners such as Elliot Manyika, the Minister without portfolio.

Highly placed sources revealed this week that the impending changes signalled a gradual change in government's disastrous pricing policy adopted last month to one that can swiftly avert company closures. Manyika, who is the vice chairman of the Cabinet Task Force on Price Monitoring and Stabilisation, yesterday held a marathon meeting with business leaders where he allegedly read them the riot act, following the government's concern that basic commodities were still not available in supermarkets and shops. He was not immediately available for comment last night.

Private sector representatives, who attended the meeting at the Industry and International Trade Ministry offices, said Manyika listened to their concerns over the impact of the price crackdown on their businesses, but was livid that goods and services remained in short supply. ZANU PF insiders insisted last night that while Manyika chaired yesterday's meeting with business leaders in his capacity as vice chairman of the taskforce, his tenure in the ad-hoc committee would soon be cut short following recommendations from the Presidium, comprising President Robert Mugabe, his two vice-presidents and ZANU PF national chairman, John Nkomo.

They cited his alleged "aggressive" approach in the implementation of the government order on prices as part of the reasons that annoyed ruling party bigwigs and other supporters who felt that Manyika's conduct could cost ZANU PF dearly in next year's harmonised elections.

Manyika would, ostensibly, be released from the task force to concentrate on the party's 2008 election campaign, which the ruling party desperately wants to win. Manyika is the party's national political commissar. Nicholas Goche, the Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, is also said to have been sidelined, although The Financial Gazette could not confirm this at the time of going to print.

While Obert Mpofu, the Minister of Industry and International Trade would be retained as chairman of the taskforce by virtue of his portfolio in Cabinet, part of his responsibilities could be offloaded to his deputy, Phineas Chihota, who is tipped to take over from Manyika as taskforce deputy chairman. Manyika had taken to the job enthusiastically, leaning on his position as ZANU PF's national political commissar to aggressively drive the price directive in the direction of the ruling Zanu PF party's ambitions. New members of the task force will include Economic Development Minister Sylvester Nguni and Webster Shamu, the Minister of Policy Implementation. No one in government was keen on commenting on the latest development.

Chihota, who also attended yesterday's meeting with the business sector did not return calls made by this newspaper earlier in the day. Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said he could not comment as he was still mourning his late son, Mandlenkosi Ephraim. His deputy, Bright Matonga, said he was not privy to the latest issues surrounding the taskforce as he had been out of the office. "I am not in the picture as I have been out of the office but try the Minister of Industry and International Trade (Mpofu), he will certainly know," said Matonga. Mpofu was unavailable yesterday as he was reportedly attending the Southern African Development Community summit in Lusaka, Zambia, where he took part in a SADC ministers' meeting.

In a bid to build bridges with the business community, which has been dealt a body blow by the clampdown on prices, government has sought to sideline ministers who have lost industry's trust, sources said. Yet others said Manyika and Goche had been caught up in ZANU PF's blame-game and political inferno ahead of next year's harmonised elections, in which the ruling party faces a fractured Movement for Democratic Change. In May this year, Manyika and Goche waltzed into the eye of the storm over the handling of elections in Masvingo and Bulawayo where ZANU PF heavyweights pulling the strings in the two provinces felt the duo wanted to dilute their influence. Provincial executive elections in Bulawayo had to be postponed after the process degenerated into chaos, with the interim executive led by Macloud Tshawe being accused of locking out some members allied to former war veterans chairman Jabulani Sibanda, who was expelled from ZANU PF in 2004.

Red lights started flashing for Manyika when former finance minister Simba Makoni was said to have embarrassed Manyika at a recent ZANU PF politburo meeting. It is not clear why there are moves to remove Goche from the task force, where he had been nominated by virtue of him being chair of the Tripartite Negotiating Forum, a round-table of government, business and labour that has for years tried to stabilise prices through dialogue. The Cabinet - which established the Task Force on June 19 - has now mandated Vice President Joice Mujuru to "work closely" with the taskforce, the sources said. Mujuru and central bank governor Gideon Gono have generally been viewed as supportive of a less radical approach to dealing with business. Although government has remained boisterous in public about its policy, it recently conceded some ground in the war, approving increases in the prices of a range of goods, including bread, packaging materials, stock-feed and cement.

The concession, while seen as insufficient by industry, showed government now acknowledges the negative impact of its crackdown. The exercise has been dogged by accusations that members of the government's price monitoring teams, including senior officials and police officers, have taken advantage of their positions to loot shops. Since government's June 25 order to manufacturers and retailers to reduce the prices of all goods and services by 50 percent, hoping to tame world record inflation, massive shortages have hit the country, worsening an already critical economic crisis. Empty supermarket shelves and long queues across the country have provided the clearest signs that the price slash has dismally failed, only compounding the current economic crisis that has shattered the once robust economy.

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP