The Sunday Mail
Dr Charles Chavhunduka
Devolution is essentially a decentralised form of governance.
When Government makes a conscious decision to devolve, it cedes some powers to its lower tier governance structures.
In the case of Zimbabwe, it can be to local authorities, be it urban, rural or metropolitan councils. But what does it mean when we say we are ceding part of the decision making power to these lower tiers of Government?
We are simply giving them power to raise their own revenue, retain it, and use it to plan for various economic activities within their areas of jurisdiction, carry out development, maintain infrastructure and provide services. In other terms, devolution is simply decentralisation.
In a devolved State, the Minister of Local Government will not interfere much with the running of local authorities or metropolitan councils. Currently, if an urban or rural council wants to borrow money from a bank, it needs permission from the Minister of Local Government.
However, under a decentralised system, council has power to negotiate its loans without permission from central government.
Successful devolution is something that takes place in countries that are mature and stable in systems of governance and politics.
Once there is that kind of environment, the central Government, because of confidence in its systems can move to devolve power to lower tiers of power. This is usually enabled through a Constitution, hence we talk of constitutional democracy.
Most African countries have adopted devolution because of the global movement towards constitutionalism and because that is the direction the world is taking as encouraged by the United Nations framework.
Before we talk about devolution as enshrined in the current Constitution of Zimbabwe, people must be reminded that Zimbabwe has been trying to implement decentralization since the Prime Minister’s directive of 1984.
But there has not been much decentralisation that has taken place since them.
Benefits of devolutions
If properly implemented, devolution has a lot of advantages to the ordinary person.
It would mean that with devolution they have more chance of participating in decision making or to participate in issues that affect them.
Currently decisions are made in Harare and the decisions made are usually remote from the problems and people in areas such as Mwenezi, Mukumbura, Gokwe or Esigodini.
However, if the decisions are being made by the a rural district council, then the decision making forum is brought closer to the people.
People are able to raise their problems and also get an opportunity to prescribe solutions to solving their challenges.
This also improves service delivery, because there will be dialogue between the council authority and the citizen.
The locals are better motivated to pay their taxes because they can easily make the council accountable.
Thus, if done well and according to the book, the devolution drive being pushed by President Mnangagwa’s administration will enhance service delivery, development and national growth.
However devolution if not implemented well it has disadvantages.
Naturally, it is known that resources are never equally distributed. Geographically some areas are more endowed with resources than others.
For example, Manicaland is endowed with natural resources compared to Harare while the capital city has more industrial activity potential compared to Mashonaland Central.
Thus, if there is devolution, some areas are bound to develop at a faster rate compared to others.
If the planning system is not strong enough to re distribute income this will certainly cause problems in a country.
Where devolution has been implemented, because of inequalities of resource endowment amongst localities, there is a redistribution of income or equalisation grants to make sure that people in localities with less economic activity also benefit from the system.
There would also be need for an incentive for those people in areas with more economic activity so that they are not demotivated or in some cases angered by the resource redistribution.
That is when the equalisation grants come in so that such shortcomings are countered.
Another disadvantage which comes with devolution, is parochialism.
In countries where there is ethnic differences, resources can be taken to belong to a certain tribe, such that resources lose national belonging.
This is usually a problem in immature democracies or developing country and can cause a lot problems for a country.
We have seen such problems in South Sudan, in the area called Unity State.
The State has been fighting against the South Sudan national Government to control the oil which is in that area.
There are war lords who are in control of the locality and they are the ones who pocket the oil revenue.
Thus, there is need for some checks and balances which will counter parochialism.
In such instances, the Government would need to first educate it citizens on the importance of devolution so that it does not become misinterpreted or abused by localities that are influential.
Devolution Success Stories
In Africa, Ethiopia stands out amongst the rest as having successfully managed to devolve.
The major advantage that Ethiopia had was that its type of governance is federal and most countries including Zimbabwe are unitary states.
In a federal system, the States have relative autonomy to make more decisions about their areas.
This type of system brings development and more importantly it makes the people more content and there is less friction with the central government.
In Ethiopia, at lower level, they have what they call woredas and kebele which are equivalent to our wards and districts.
These wards and districts have some autonomy and power to make decisions.
Kenya is also talking about devolution in their Constitution, they were talking about the district focus which did not work quite well.
Zambia once worked on devolution in the 1980s, however it did not work well. There was no political will.
Dr Charles Chavhunduka is a senior Lecturer and chairman in the department of Rural and Urban Planning at the University of Zimbabwe. He shared his views with our reporter Debra Matabvu.
