The Sunday Mail
Zimbabwe ate too much British book.
And even now, 36 years after the attainment of Independence, we still have quite an attachment to British ways of doing things.
We even have Presidential aspirants who believe that telling us that they will drag us back into the Commonwealth is solid campaign material. But that is another matter.
Consider our system of appointing Cabinet ministers: a system that is as debilitating as it is British.
The Westminster system in use here means almost every minister in Cabinet must hold an elective legislative seat.
It means that the President of the Republic can only appoint very few people to Cabinet because of their technical expertise. The majority will be appointed because they have Parliamentary seats.
Yes, loyalty is of utmost importance and the constituency elective process helps determine commitment to the political cause.
But at the same time, loyalty without expertise does the nation no good.
We pride ourselves on being among both the best educated and most literate countries in Africa.
Surely we can find people who are both loyal and educated.
Certainly, there are some portfolios – such as Foreign Affairs, Defence, Home Affairs, Information and Intelligence to name a few – which are best served by robust politicians who understand the game of statecraft.
But even these require a measure of technical skill.
President Mugabe has over the years walked a fine line in balancing the loyalty/political acumen and technical expertise aspects of Cabinet appointments. However, President Mugabe has had to largely appoint politicians – some with inadequate grasp of what they should be doing – to some portfolios simply because he must pick a Cabinet from elected MPs.
Politics can be quite a dirty game. And for that reason many people who have something to contribute to the nation are ruled out from executive appointment simply because they do not want to put themselves and their families through the bruising battles of constituency electoral contests.
Let us consider aspects of the system used in the United States.
Secretaries, who are the equivalent of our ministers, do not necessarily have to be politicians, unless of course they are being considered for the almost purely “political” briefs like Secretary of State/Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Many portfolio heads in the United States are selected on the basis of loyalty to the ruling party and their technical expertise.
Furthermore, and equally important, the portfolio heads all generally possess the necessary attribute of understanding the national interest and being patriotic.
This has allowed the United States to harness the executive skills of people who would otherwise never make it into Cabinet should they have to go through the often brutal world of campaigning for a seat.
The America system also allows, to an extent, for a clearer separation between the executive and legislature, allowing oversight roles to be played accordingly, and for the members of Cabinet to better focus on their duties instead of dividing their time and energies between executive work, constituency matters and cheap politicking.
Before we are hanged for suggesting this, it should be appreciated that no country in the world has developed without acquiring the capacity to adopt and adapt from other nations – whether friends or foes.
That the US continues to impose illegal sanctions on us does not mean they can embargo ideas.
Let us consider how other countries do business and see what aspects of their systems could work for us here.
This enjoinder to have policy debate on what system to use has been necessitated by the fact for decades we have had many brilliant proposals but we seem to always fall short on full implementation.
As we speak, Zim-Asset – a five-year economic transformation blueprint – is reaching the midpoint of its lifespan but electricity, water, housing, employment and universal access to quality healthcare remain problematic.
President Mugabe enunciated the 10-Point Economic Growth Plan last year and we hardly hear a whisper from elected officials about what is happening on that Zim-Asset-aligned front.
For our country to move forward, it needs a team of ministers who are acutely politically aware and technically capable at the same time.
We do not need this nonsense of public officials who are more concerned with factional battles and feathering their own nests.
COMMENT: Perhaps we should go American
The Sunday Mail
Zimbabwe ate too much British book.
And even now, 36 years after the attainment of Independence, we still have quite an attachment to British ways of doing things.
We even have Presidential aspirants who believe that telling us that they will drag us back into the Commonwealth is solid campaign material. But that is another matter.
Consider our system of appointing Cabinet ministers: a system that is as debilitating as it is British.
The Westminster system in use here means almost every minister in Cabinet must hold an elective legislative seat.
It means that the President of the Republic can only appoint very few people to Cabinet because of their technical expertise. The majority will be appointed because they have Parliamentary seats.
Yes, loyalty is of utmost importance and the constituency elective process helps determine commitment to the political cause.
But at the same time, loyalty without expertise does the nation no good.
We pride ourselves on being among both the best educated and most literate countries in Africa.
Surely we can find people who are both loyal and educated.
Certainly, there are some portfolios – such as Foreign Affairs, Defence, Home Affairs, Information and Intelligence to name a few – which are best served by robust politicians who understand the game of statecraft.
But even these require a measure of technical skill.
President Mugabe has over the years walked a fine line in balancing the loyalty/political acumen and technical expertise aspects of Cabinet appointments. However, President Mugabe has had to largely appoint politicians – some with inadequate grasp of what they should be doing – to some portfolios simply because he must pick a Cabinet from elected MPs.
Politics can be quite a dirty game. And for that reason many people who have something to contribute to the nation are ruled out from executive appointment simply because they do not want to put themselves and their families through the bruising battles of constituency electoral contests.
Let us consider aspects of the system used in the United States.
Secretaries, who are the equivalent of our ministers, do not necessarily have to be politicians, unless of course they are being considered for the almost purely “political” briefs like Secretary of State/Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Many portfolio heads in the United States are selected on the basis of loyalty to the ruling party and their technical expertise.
Furthermore, and equally important, the portfolio heads all generally possess the necessary attribute of understanding the national interest and being patriotic.
This has allowed the United States to harness the executive skills of people who would otherwise never make it into Cabinet should they have to go through the often brutal world of campaigning for a seat.
The America system also allows, to an extent, for a clearer separation between the executive and legislature, allowing oversight roles to be played accordingly, and for the members of Cabinet to better focus on their duties instead of dividing their time and energies between executive work, constituency matters and cheap politicking.
Before we are hanged for suggesting this, it should be appreciated that no country in the world has developed without acquiring the capacity to adopt and adapt from other nations – whether friends or foes.
That the US continues to impose illegal sanctions on us does not mean they can embargo ideas.
Let us consider how other countries do business and see what aspects of their systems could work for us here.
This enjoinder to have policy debate on what system to use has been necessitated by the fact for decades we have had many brilliant proposals but we seem to always fall short on full implementation.
As we speak, Zim-Asset – a five-year economic transformation blueprint – is reaching the midpoint of its lifespan but electricity, water, housing, employment and universal access to quality healthcare remain problematic.
President Mugabe enunciated the 10-Point Economic Growth Plan last year and we hardly hear a whisper from elected officials about what is happening on that Zim-Asset-aligned front.
For our country to move forward, it needs a team of ministers who are acutely politically aware and technically capable at the same time.
We do not need this nonsense of public officials who are more concerned with factional battles and feathering their own nests.
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