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Confusing signals!
Comment, The Financial Gazette (Zimbabwe)
March 09, 2006

http://www.fingaz.co.zw/story.aspx?stid=827

ZIMBABWE, whose economy is stuck in the deep end, continues to suffer bruising setbacks to its desperate efforts to reintegrate into the broader community of nations.

Forget the government’s much-vaunted "Look East" policy where the country has only been getting nothing more than high-sounding "good" words. And it is not difficult to see why. The international community has certainly noticed the glaring policy contradictions coming out of the Zimbabwean government.

More-often-than-not, government ministers never sing from the same hymn sheet on key policy issues, giving one the impression that they are not only confused but they also confuse for Zimbabwe as well.

Take the emotive land issue for instance which has already run into a wall of negative investor sentiment, reducing potentially one of Africa’s wealthiest nations into an economic basket case. A few months ago it was reported but it has not been denied that Didymus Mutasa had said that all remaining commercial white farmers should be booted out of their properties.

". . . Operation Murambatvsina should also be applied to the land reform programme to clean the commercial farms that are still in the hands of white farmers. The government will not hesitate to take their farms to resettle the black people who failed to get land during the redistribution exercise . . . They are similar to the filth that was in the streets before Murambatsvina," Mutasa was quoted as saying by a local weekly last September.

To a neutral observer, the import of what Mutasa said was that the controversial land reform initiative, far from being a vehicle to achieve black economic empowerment and address historical injustices, is being cut and welded into a weapon to settle racial scores. In other words, it is now government policy to practise reverse racism — the lowest form of bigotry and prejudice — which itself belongs to history’s septic tank. Suffice to say that the implications of Mutasa’s comments become more acute and sharper given that he is not only the all-powerful Minister of State Security, Land, Land Reform and Resettlement but also an important voice in the inner circle of the ruling ZANU PF!

Only last week another senior member of the party and government, Joseph Msika, was quoted as saying that white farmers should not be removed from their farms purely on the basis of the colour of their skin because the land reform programme was based on the principle of one-man-one-vote. "Our policy is not to drive all whites out of their farms," Msika told a Zimbabwe Farmers Union congress in Bulawayo.

Which raises more questions than answers. What is the government policy as regards white farm ownership? Can there ever be more confusing signals from the Zimbabwean government to the international community and risk averse foreign investors with whom the country is seeking a deeper rapprochement? What message is the government sending out with these contradictions? Do they know anything about perception? This is unbelievable, defies logic and it ought never to have happened. It is a grotesque blunder by the government which does not help the increasingly ostracised Zimbabwe’s case.

Although ZANU PF politicians, who we doubt ever pause to take stock of the problems that have produced poison-tipped arrows aimed at the heart of the economy, do not want to admit it, it should not be forgotten that the shine disappeared from Zimbabwe as an attractive investment destination precisely because of differences over the form, style and approach of the land reform exercise. There is luminous evidence of this.

Indeed land-related issues are at the core of the country’s problems today be it concerns over law and order issues, violence, judiciary matters, adverse publicity, donor stand-off, country risk and low foreign direct investment.

This can only mean therefore that inconsistent and contradictory policy statements over the same issue will inevitably complicate the situation under the still unfolding economic crisis. It casts a pall over Zimbabwe’s commitment to mend fences with the international community. This means that a return to a normal relationship with investors will be difficult and lengthy — giving another twist to the screws on the economy. This makes life difficult for those who find themselves at the sharp edge of delicate economic turnaround efforts. The earlier the government realises that contradictory policy pronouncements scare away circumspect investors the better.

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