THERE are things that important institutions like Parliament must never rush through such as national blueprints just to get the job done.
If legislators, who carry an important oversight role adopt the habit of rushing through important paperwork, programmes and projects without scrutiny, then Zimbabwe is doomed.
A case in point is the report by Veritas, a legal think tank, that the passage of the 2022 national budget last week may have been rushed, with so many grey areas being passed without much scrutiny.
This is a recipe for disaster.
Ahead of the passage of the paper, experts raised the red flag over several defects, and legislators should have taken note and ensured everything was in order before appending their signatures to the budget.
The problem is that there is a dearth of reading culture in Zimbabwe, with everyone spending much of their time on social media, hence the task of reading through a voluminous technical paper such as the national budget has become a chore.
A typical example was the failure by the budget to meet the Abuja Declaration requirement.
The declaration calls upon member States to ensure that a minimum of 15% of the budget goes to health.
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Further, the budget decimated efforts to build an inclusive digital economy by imposing a US$50 tax on the registration of smartphones by mobile network operators — this is like a “‘black tax” used in the colonial states to keep the indigenous citizens of a country in economic shackles that were perennially difficult to get rid of.
The budget did not make clear how it would stimulate the re-industrialisation of the country.
These are some of the issues raised by experts. But there was no attempt to address them before legislators endorsed such an important paper.
The budget is an important national document, and if the issues raised by Veritas were not rectified, it is important that the budget returns to Senate for thorough scrutiny.
Zimbabwe is in its current State because of such behaviour.
Not every senator must be knowledgeable about the budget and other technical papers. But where such papers are involved, senators must receive enough briefing to help them make decisions.
Zimbabwe’s Parliament has such arms in place.
This is seen through such events as post budget seminars, but given the concerns raised by Veritas, legislators still have a long way to understand what the budget stands for. But hope may not have been lost. Work towards improving the legislators’ appreciation of important papers must be ongoing, and real work must start now.
