MUTARE - The solution to the country's quest for sustainable growth path will only be found when the political playing field is levelled, top business and civil society leaders have said. The leaders and policy-makers criticised the poor performance of the Global Political Agreement (GPA) and blamed President Robert Mugabe for violating the terms of agreement.
Speaking after a Zimbabwe Trade and Development Centre (ZTDC) business breakfast meeting held at a local hotel last week, the Chief Executive Officer of Zimbabwe Economic Consultants, Jameson Takaedza, who is also an economist, said the on-going political bickering between the two major parties MDC-T and Zanu (PF) hampered efforts to attain development
security in the country.
Alfred Munemo from Zimbabwe Indigenous Development Trust (ZIDT), a civic society group told the civic leaders and other policy-makers that the continued invasions of white owned properties and harassment of NGOs would have a serious impact on Zimbabwe’s economic and social growth.
Munemo estimated that about 30 percent of Zimbabwe’s food stocks are lost each year due to poor farming facilities and transport systems faced by the resettled farmers whom most of them are war veterans without farming knowledge.
“The banks should try to get back into infrastructure and farming projects,” he said, while avoiding “mistakes”, red tape, environmental impacts and “white elephants”.
He added that the coalition government should embark on a fast-track programme to boost infrastructure and should pursue a number of initiatives to build facilities.
The business leaders also identified top priorities for pragmatic action, including getting global trade talks back on track, exposing corruption both by givers and recipients, investing heavily in long-term industrial and agricultural projects in Zimbabwe.
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