Stop talking tribalism – Mushonga

the Minister of Regional Integration and International Cooperation, Priscilla Misihairambwi-Mushonga has said.

Mushonga was addressing party supporters at Ascot Race Course here last week.

She said the antagonism between the people in Matabeleland resulted in the region failing to use the abundant resources it possessed.

She said the bitterness hovering in the region was taking its toll on the peoples development projects.

Matabeleland has plenty of resources and the people should be wealthy. If we compare you (Matabeleland) with other regions, you lag behind. Look at Chiadzwa, the money is there. Then look at Matabeleland, it is poor. Then you start to wonder why. The biggest strength of other provinces is that the leaders can bring wealth for their own people, she said.

Mushonga said unlike other provinces that were focusing on developmental projects, people from the region were playing the blame game, pointing fingers and accusing each other.

She said people must stop talking about tribalism and focus on upgrading the region.

The biggest problem is that you are always pointing fingers saying we are better than them or that group is better than that one. While you are doing that other provinces are busy moving forward making money and improving themselves. There are people who also benefit from such situations. They hide somewhere and use such issues to execute their own agendas, she said.

Mushonga said politicians must strategise on ways of ensuring that their areas realise their full potential.

I have been telling my other counterparts that regions must be treated well, fairly and equally, she said.

Mushonga said, it was important to pave way for equal benefits and promote ongoing developmental projects in the region. She said, through her ministry, she could do a lot for Matabeleland.

With the advantages of my ministry, I can focus on a variety of projects. There is the North and South corridor border post. It is the biggest, it runs via Limpompo across Zambia and Malawi and the Beitbridge border post, which is the busiest in Africa, she said.

Mushonga said another challenge was to change the mindset of donors. She said the donor community must be alerted that they must not focus on one area of aid and neglect others.

Aid must not only be in the form of farming inputs as there are places that dont focus on crop farming but cattle rearing. Its about changing their mindset, she said.

The minister said tribalism could not be tolerated if people wanted progress,

because it divided them.