Chiadzwa diamonds are not forever: Chamba

By Dr Raymond Chamba

It gives me great pleasure to outline a new sustainable vision for the way forward in Zimbabwe as we continue to build a country of excellence. It’s people like you that fought for jobs and opportunity for generations of Zimbabwean citizens.

The common woman and man have been squeezed out of the Zimbabwean independence dream. Its ordinary men and women like you that helped build an arsenal of democracy that defeated the oppressors. It is unions like yours that are standing steadfast against repression.

You remind us that no matter how tough times get, Zimbabweans are tougher. No matter how many punches we take, we don’t give up. We get up, we fight back, we move forward, and we come out the other side stronger than before.

There is a definite hunger for leadership-new and real leadership in Zimbabwe. Ordinary citizens feel let down by the persistent partisan posturing. Instead of facing the burning questions confronting our nation, we are readily given to burning each other up. Instead of hunting for solutions that confound this republic, we are so easily given to hunting each other down.

Even the feeble protestations of being powerless by certain partners in this dysfunctional coalition arrangement are not matched by the great indifference they now show to the plight of the ordinary citizens and the slow descent into pettiness they exhibit is only matched by the power they have to attend to their massive erections.

Life in Zimbabwe has generally degenerated into a revolutionary proposition. With 95% unemployment, streets strewn with litter and potholes, water supply systems filled with faeces, and electrical supply so erratic that brief moments of supply send the young into unbridled screams of delirium.

Mediocrity has taken root as the least able and most corrupt of us call the shots, and structure odious mining deals that have sold the country to the least honest investors. The ones even my dogs can’t stand. If we have to get something right we urgently need to revisit the diamond mining arrangements at Chiadzwa.

I come before you as a penultimate expression of the success of the revolution. It has finally produced those who dare dissent for the good of assuring its continued successful and relevance into the lives of the ordinary citizens of this country. Before independence we had our resources raped and pillaged in order to conscribe to the perpetuation of the colonial order.

Keeping law and order (sublimated form of violence) meant that the continued suppression of economic benefits to our people was duly supported by the construct of law. Political independence thus achieved, we now need to rescue Zimbabwe from its self.

To provide for a new leadership narrative that ensures the individual freedoms and leadership of individuals within the sphere of their personal and professional excellence. Chiadzwa diamond fields represent the practical promise of God to stand by the people of this country in a time of dire need.

The faithless, faceless, murky, technically inexact value extraction platforms in place represent in their operational darkness the failure to keep the charge to responsibly transform the lives of ordinary people of this country through our God-given resources.

Yes, the resources are God given but the exploitation borders on the Satanic. Chiadzwa mining needs to be rested on the true understanding of the value we hold and not the desperation we show, nor should the past friendships get in the way of creating value for the nation at large.

The tie in of the defence organizational complex to form Anjin or perhaps (defence institutions + Anjin) Dinjin represents a gross vulgarization, minimization of public interest, and indeed abdication of the state economic duty of care for the common welfare.

That model represents the triumph of contestable special interests and if indeed it’s the best model to follow where are the diamond exploitation partnership arrangements with teachers, nurses, engineers, bankers, orphans, the poor and the invalid.

For all the promise of potentially delivering 100m+ carats of annual production all we have seen is a tale of displacement, despair, gross environmental degradation, if not a steady descend with renewed vigor into the narrow discredited politics of intransigency and incumbency.

For a nation long abused by sanctioned progress, dysfunctional common dialogue of truly all embracing national interest, diamond mining should be rightfully positioned as a platform of a common hope, progress and prosperity. There is need for revolutionary economic shock therapy to get us walking tall again as Zimbabweans.

We need something to make us stand tall and proud again-strategically liberate diamonds into the hands of the ordinary citizen. To ensure equity and assure immediate and effective benefit for all I propose a radical re-examination of the diamond mining operations industry in Chiadzwa along the following ways:

1)      An immediate delegation of minimum production target of 15million carats of medium grade diamonds for the revolutionary release into the hands of all citizens. Yes everyone getting a state sanctioned carat per annum for a start. The fields can easily deliver 120million+ carats per annum.

2)      People would be free to extract their value in any of the following ways

a)      As a physical parcel from a created the state distribution agency.

b)      As a tax rebate of the same set value.

c)      As a locally tradable investment security of the same under the mooted Zimbabwe Sovereign Wealth Fund platform.

If the soldiers can own and operate in the fields, why can’t our teachers, nurses, bankers, orphans and unemployed people  consigned to the streets directly enjoy our natural resources? If true economic empowerment is not a by-word for unmitigated personal and accelerated plunder and pilferage of our resources then it needs to start at Chiadzwa.

We are sick and tired of a government that seems to think that the only legitimate resources from the ground that belong to the ordinary people are mice. Chiadzwa should not be used like some hard-working village whore.

In this regard, the main thrust of this radical re-examination of the diamond mining operations in Chiadzwa will be to maintain macroeconomic stability, restore and transform the economy’s capacity to produce goods and services competitively for empowerment and poverty reduction.

Sadly and lastly, Zimbabwe is known for producing quality economic blue prints which have fallen short on implementation or fantastic documents that remain tucked in some bottom drawer in some government office.

It’s well known for giving birth to great minds like Nathaniel Manheru who sadly don’t proffer any solutions but wax lyrical in the primitive, staid, and narrow descent into the personal as exhibited by the recent juvenile attacks on some coalition government partners.

Since Chiadzwa diamonds are not forever, we need to carefully utilize them to build platforms of peace, and bridges of common prosperity.

We are the change we seek and the hope we expect.

Dr. Raymond Chamba, Independent Presidential Candidate, Email: [email protected]