The Sunday Mail
Land reform and indigenisation are profoundly necessary. I am whole-heartedly supportive of both. However, we need to be very careful how we go about implementing these policies. Our means of implementation, based on how the policies are structured either as law or practical engagement, often lack widespread distributive justice.
By widespread distributive justice I mean that a policy, especially of an empowering nature, must be designed with two key factors in mind; equality in impact and outreach by numbers.
If a policy is driven on the ethos of nationalism, then it should grant as close to equal benefit to one citizen as it does to the next. The policy must be evaluated by how many citizens it benefits.
In this regard, I am critical of the current indigenisation policy, in particular its equity model which we are now told could be possibly amended.
The capital-raising demands of 51 percent ownership are likely to marginalise less financially capable citizens from benefiting, let alone participating in the process.
Unless the 51 percent stake is being taken on by the State it is difficult to see how the financially challenged majority benefit from a local tycoon now owning a stake in a previously foreign enterprise.
The Production Sharing Model seems more judicious since the benefit flows directly to the State.
Similarly with land reform, even though land was distributed to a large number of people, you find that even then we have not spread the benefits as well as we could have.
Take, for instance, the fact that one black individual may now own a 1 000-hectare farm.
This is a good thing, but the concern as to how the man in Epworth can also derive benefit from that natural resource remains unanswered. We cannot possibly resettle everyone. So we need another way to redistribute wealth.
A possibility is a land tax. This would generate tax revenue. Secondly, would compel land owners to become productive. If the individual with 1 000 hectares of land is faced with a bill of, say, US$21 per hectare, they are induced into being productive so as to cover that bill.
In both policies then it seems that eventual tax revenue collection by the State would be the best means to connect policy to the majority.
However, there may be a more direct way that attends to equality of impact, and outreach of empowerment.
The majority of us directly and frequently rely on public services in one way or the other. It’s from this premise that I can argue that the majority of citizens are more likely to be directly empowered through public services than they are through current indigenisation and land reform policy structures.
Education and health are fundamental tools of empowerment. A healthy and educated citizen is the ideally empowered citizen.
The overwhelming majority of our population seek these tools of empowerment through public services. Specifically, public education and public health.
The quality of both education and health is dependent on the facility at which they are offered. In other words, infrastructure.
Unfortunately, the standard of infrastructure that they are being offered presently is imperfect. Many schools do not offer enough textbooks to students.
In a technology age, computers and internet are not yet as widespread in public schools as they should be. Medical facilities have suffered from shortage of drugs and quality equipment.
This infrastructural deficiency exists as well in other public services that supplement the empowerment of citizens.
For various reasons, the institutions responsible for providing services such as water, electricity and public works are struggling to fulfil their mandates.
Hence, it is my suggestion that we direct a larger share of the burden to more capable and incentivised entities. We can do this through public-private partnerships between State municipalities and foreign entities. Such partnerships are concession contracts in which infrastructure for services or works are provided by the private sector.
This option was touched on by the President at his inauguration speech of the eighth Parliament last year, and was left open for debate. I vouch for it. It would be practical and far-reaching.
For instance, if there is a technology multinational interested in operations in Gweru, why not place set infrastructural expectations that benefit that city?
The foreign company can be contracted into providing that community with a public library, internet connection in surrounding schools, and maybe even foot the bill for fibre optic construction in that city.
By placing publicly beneficial conditions on foreign enterprises, profit motive would be the driving factor for high standard public infrastructure.
Also performance would be legally binding and enforceable at our own local Zimbabwean discretion.
In this way, Government would be able to directly avail quality empowerment tools to a larger proportion of the population.
Simultaneously, it would be getting around the financial demands that can often cause disproportionate benefit amongst citizens.
If our policy pursuits are rightfully driven towards widespread empowerment, would it not seem hypocritical if we continued to offer citizens poor public services?
Especially if the greatest distributive justice of empowerment is indeed achieved through these public services.
