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Zim settlement: What's in it for the workers?
Edward Chisi, The Standard (Zimbabwe)
August 10, 2008

http://www.thestandard.co.zw/business/18667-zim-settlement-whats-in-it-for-the-workers.html

The negotiations between the country's main political players and news leaking of positive engagement among them bring a lot of hope for a new Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe may have a new beginning. Zimbabweans may begin to redeem their lost pride and dignity and re-start their work ethic to bring about a change in their fortunes. I cherish the days when Zimbabwean workers were a marvel at productivity, how they loved their work, how honest they were with their employers, their relatives and friends and how passionate and proud they were about their employers and their association with such employers, how they wanted their children and grand children to be eventually employed by the same employers.

Those days when children were taught three life stages i.e. go to school, go to work and start your own life. It pains those with a passionate concern about Zimbabwe how those workers who lived their lives on the straight and narrow and worked hard for the country and their families have become the society's laughing stock. The lives of pensioners and those of workers still hanging on to their jobs look miserable. I shall not dwell much on the past but would rather look forward like I said with renewed hope, a new hope for Zimbabwe, a new hope for millions of workers.

A new beginning is certainly needed, a beginning that will reverse all the pains and losses that our labour counts on a daily basis, for on labour shall Zimbabwe base her revival. One cannot stop thinking about what that new beginning for Zimbabwe would look like. We need all professionals in the country to begin to think of what is needed to ensure this new beginning is indeed realised and realised sooner. Time has been lost in people's lives and time will never be recovered.

It remains an enormous challenge to employers and workers to re-discover the Zimbabwean work ethic of yesteryear. The Zimbabwean worker had such characteristics as hard working, honesty, high levels of productivity, integrity, loyalty etc. At the moment we witness a worker who is dejected, whose unemployed friends appear to be living a better life than them and a worker who thinks of how not to go to work. Reports are plenty of workers who fake sickness so they have a chance to supplement their earnings which could be to buy something to sell to someone. A worker who has been reduced to vending and unfortunately this vending worker class has grown to include senior executives. We need as a nation to begin to show positive change in the fortunes of the nation that will bring hope to the working class.

We need the workers who would run to work because they are late like what the yesteryear workers used to do.

No doubt Zimbabwe has exported too many skills at a time when training institutions are facing various challenges including teaching skills and deteriorating amenities such as libraries etc. Zimbabwe needs to be attractive so that those skills could return home. This entails a genuine re-engineering of the remuneration systems existing in the country and more importantly to ensure that such remuneration achieves regional parity. At the beginning of the new Zimbabwe if such regional parity is achieved there shall be little attraction for a skill to leave home for another country.

That would not be enough if basic liberties are not restored and trade tools are availed. These factors including social amenities improvement have to be provided concurrently for a total attractive package to exist. The current situation where executives leave their work assignments early in order to look for basic supplies as water or firewood does not help if the new hope has to be realized. After a tiresome day at work workers have to content with the fact that they will have a cold meal because power has been switched off, have no bath, and have swollen limbs because of transport queues. These have to be addressed by any government running if the lost skills can be attracted back.

More importantly, industry has to be encouraged to train skills on the model of apprenticeship and graduate learnership schemes at an increased capacity and it is important that tax advantages be considered for such industries as incentives.

Zimbabwean workers with their capacity to learn fast and high education levels should be the pillars on which to rebuild industrial performance. To this end, it is important that industrial bodies such as CZI, ZNCC etc and individual organisations embrace the concept of performance measurement as a tool to enhanced industrial and organisational productivity.

Indeed we need to enter into an era where not only the performance of individuals is rewarded but that of industries and organizations as well.

Industrial bodies should set productivity targets in the same manner each organisation sets targets for individuals. Industrial performance can be measured on such parameters such as increased capacity utilization, increased earnings, increased employment levels etc and incentives such as tax advantages awarded by government when those levels are achieved or surpassed.

Once the country receives reasonable capital inflows there is need to balance the need for mechanization and job creation. In the short to medium term, the nation needs to focus on job creation to manage the streets of illegal trading and all other vices. In the long term however, mechanization to the extent of achieving competitive advantages should not be forgotten.

While protection for the weaker parties in society is one key function of any government, it must be done in a manner that does not harm the very strategies that are being implemented.

Any law should also reflect the societal stages of growth and to this end the Labour laws should also mirror the economic growth of the nation. My new hope for this nation is a revision of existing legislation that does not promote productivity like provisions on sick leave to the extent that the state will take responsibility for social welfare fully. Obviously the PAYE regime will need an urgent revision to reduce the tax burden on the workers.

This will in turn increase disposable incomes and thus stimulate demand for products and services in the economy.

Indeed there are many issues that need to be addressed to ensure that the Human Resources we have in Zimbabwe becomes the basis of this economy's revival but these are some of those areas that need immediate attention. Indeed I see the hope of a new Zimbabwe, a new beginning bringing light and a bright future to all workers. The workers of Zimbabwe should stand ready to bring Zimbabwe back to working again.

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