Back on the Horse

I just returned back to Zimbabwe after a two-week vacation in South Africa. It was a much needed break from the frustrations of Zimbabwe. It was just nice to know that when you turned on a switch, the power would come on. To be able to access good internet whenever I needed to on my cell phone. Not to have to order pizza every night because there was no power to cook. And mostly just not to have the stress of the project hanging over me.

I’ve been in Zimbabwe for more than five months now and we only just received permission from the government to start our program. We are now in start-up mode, but the timing is not great. About the same time we received our approval, the government announced that they were implementing a policy that all businesses with revenue over $500,000 will be required to have 51% local ownership. The concern of many business owners here is that “local” will soon come to be interpreted as black, and that this is simply the next source of funds to keep Mugabe’s cronies happy now that almost all the commercial farms have been taken over and distributed.

A friend’s sister in law owns a successful bookshop and shortly after the new policy was announced, she started receiving visits at the shop by wealth black couples who looked around the shop as a vulture eyes a carcass. One couple even asked her what her revenue was, who her suppliers were and other intimate details of her business. The experience did not make her feel very secure.

The original strategy of our program was to identify agribusinesses in Zimbabwe that are buying produce from smallholder farmers and work with them to build their supply chains. When we arrived in October, these partners were enthusiastic, but in recent weeks they have pulled back. Who would invest in a business that you are not sure you will be able to keep.

I wish this were not a race issue, but the government here makes it one. That said, even our partners that are black-owned are nervous because mass take-over of businesses would be devastating for the economy that is only just starting to show small signs of recovery.

A new poster has appeared on my drive home from work. It says “Two-term Presidency”. That’s all. It seems like a simple desire, but is that really all it would take to start significant change?