EXTENSION OF LEVEL 4 LOCKDOWN AND LACK OF CONSULTATION IN GOVERNMENT’S RESPONSE TO COVID
We note with serious concern the continued lack of consultation in the government’s response to Covid-19. Stakeholders from across the board, inclusive of business, education sector and the church have called on the government to consult and include sector representatives in the Covid-19 National Taskforce. Regrettably, the government has failed to take head on these calls. The result is that the nation has been subjected to half baked inferior solutions that continue to inflict unnecessary pain on citizens. Churches are the latest to call out the government for pronouncing unworkable measures for the resumption of church gatherings. Equally, the hospitality sector has raised questions on blanket bans that treat enclosed venues exactly the same way as open air spaces. Similarly teachers’ unions have decried the lack of consultations in the planned reopening of schools. The government has clearly failed to take a “whole system” approach, pronouncing supposed solutions in one area while creating worse problems in other areas. For instance, it baffles the mind that the government has totally disregarded the issue of social support to vulnerable citizens who have been adversely affected by the restrictions on economic activity over the past one and half years. Another crying example of the government’s failed response is how lockdown measures have unleashed a pandemic of unprecedented police harassment, extortion and looting against poor citizens and small businesses that dwarf the worst abuses experienced under the Chihuri days. Surely, someone in government has to be aware of the total breakdown in discipline among the Zimbabwe Republic Police and the horrendous abuses being carried out in the name of enforcing lockdown measures. We reiterate our longstanding call for the Commissioner General of the police and the Minister responsible to appear before parliament and explain the ongoing pandemic of police abuses and harassment and what will be done to hold those responsible accountable for their actions.
CONTINUED SCHOOL CLOSURES AND E-LEARNING
We are worried by the absence of a clear plan on how to ensure that school children, especially those of working class and poor backgrounds, are not left behind as schools remain closed. While the government’s recently announced initiative to provide free internet services, for nine months, to 400 schools is a step in the right direction, it is too little, too late. Just 400 schools out of the thousands in the country is a mere drop in the ocean. In any case, the facility is for schools that already have connectivity, yet there has not been a corresponding plan on how to deal with schools that have no connectivity, let alone a clear target on extending the facility beyond the first 400 schools with connectivity. The extension of the free access facility to internet services at Community Information Centres and Community Village Information Centres, while commendable, will not achieve much due to two reasons. First, many parts of the country have no such centres. Secondly, even those that have centres in their areas are going to be hamstrung by the general poor connectivity that, of late, has pervaded the country. It is much concerning that despite the Cabinet’s adoption of the National e-Learning Strategy, in the first quarter of 2021, not much ground has been covered in transforming the education sector through the development of adequate technological capacity for both learners and educators regardless of geographical location or economic circumstance as promised. What we see are disjointed and piecemeal interventions by the government that portray a lack of coordination. We therefore reiterate our call for the government to embrace stakeholders in the education sector and beyond in coming up with an inclusive, coherent and feasible plan to guarantee children’s access to education without exposing them to the risk posed by the pandemic.
TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY IN DEALING WITH PUBLIC FUNDS AND ASSETS
We reiterate our earlier call for utmost transparency and accountability in how the government deals with public funds and assets. To this end, we urge the government to fully account for the Universal Access Fund held by POTRAZ and is meant to support expanded access to digital platforms for underprivileged communities. We would want the government to be transparent in revealing the amount utilized towards the main mandate against contribution to UNICEF’s GIGA programme. In the same vein, we are aware of press reports to the effect that the government has identified ten investors to buy a 60 percent stake in Fidelity Gold Refinery. The nation should be told who the ten buyers are, and whether the $49 million consideration is the best deal that the nation could get from disposing of the resource. The Minister of Finance must reassure the nation that this is not just another pretext for dishing out patronage and stripping the country of critical assets at depressed values.