There were shocking upheavals in Britain this week. Prime Minister Keir Starmer walked away after losing the confidence of those who gave him the mandate to govern.
This is how functioning democracies are supposed to operate.
Public office is not a lifetime entitlement. It is a contract between leaders and the people. When trust evaporates or when leaders fail to deliver, they must leave.
That simple principle separates countries that work from those that survive on slogans.
Britain is far from perfect, I agree. It battles economic pressures, political divisions and social tensions. Yet one thing stands out on that island.
Leaders are expected to account for failure. Since the Brexit referendum brought down David Cameron in 2016, Britain has gone through six prime ministers. Theresa May was also consumed by the Brexit fires. Boris Johnson was brought down by scandal. Liz Truss lasted just 49 days after frightening financial markets with ill-conceived policies. Rishi Sunak paid the price for electoral defeat. This week, Starmer joined the list. And as we speak, Britain is preparing for its seventh prime minister in a decade.
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Reasons for these exits differ, but the principle remains the same. Political authority rests on the confidence of the electorate. When leaders lose it, they leave.
Now imagine if Zimbabwe operated by those same principles.
By Tuesday this week, half the country’s local authorities would have resigned over sewages that gush through residential communities.
By Wednesday, road authorities would be clearing their desks over highways that have turned into slaughterhouses. By Thursday, health officials would be packing their offices as desperate families sell cattle to pay medical bills in hospitals without medicines. By Friday, education authorities would be explaining why children complete school unable to read or write properly.
By the weekend, one wonders who would still be left standing. That is accountability.
Imagine if economic pain carried consequences. Businesses are shutting down, and formal jobs are disappearing. Young graduates roam the streets clutching certificates that have become expensive souvenirs.
Our pensioners are surviving on crumbs. Our industries are groaning under heavy taxes, policy uncertainty and brutal power cuts. Yet those presiding over this misery speak as though they are managing Singapore, or such other advanced economy.
Imagine if road carnage attracted accountability. Zimbabweans perish daily in accidents that should never happen. Buses that should have been condemned continue carrying passengers, while potholes have turned into a real menace. Enforcement remains selective. But in serious democracies, careers would end over such tragedies.
Imagine if hospitals functioned under the standards expected elsewhere. Our mothers would not give birth in degrading conditions.
Cancer patients would be unable to access treatment, and families would not import basic medicines. At the same time, our doctors and nurses would not flee in their thousands in a country where preventable deaths are becoming a routine. Yet nobody resigns, or apologises. But perhaps the greatest tragedy lies elsewhere.
In countries where institutions work, failure carries shame. In Zimbabwe, failure often attracts promotions. Officials preside over disasters and emerge more powerful, while broken systems are defended and excuses replace solutions. Citizens are expected to endure while those responsible congratulate themselves.
If Zimbabwe truly mirrored how progressive economies work, the chain of resignations would be astonishing. Economic managers would resign over deepening hardship.
And accountability would not stop at the bottom.
It would climb all the way to the top, because genuine democracies understand a truth that failed systems refuse to confront — responsibility rises with power.
That is why functioning nations keep correcting themselves while broken systems keep searching for enemies.
And perhaps that explains why some countries recover from their mistakes while others spend decades surviving them.
I do not envy the British. But one cannot help admiring a system that understands that no one is bigger than the public office they occupy.