Govt to remove bureaucracy - Musokotwane
December 22, 2008
Finance and National Planning Minister, Situmbeko Musokotwane said the Government would encourage private sector participation by removing bureaucracy and making it easy for people to start doing business.
Private Sector Development Association (PSDA) chairperson, Yusuf Dodia urged the Government to avoid borrowing from banks next year so as not to create more pressure on the financial sector.
Mr Dodia said the Citizens Economic Empowerment Commission (CEEC) and the Development Bank of Zambia (DBZ) should be merged so that they could assist Zambians in starting up businesses.
Another businessman, Jeremiah Dauya said the Government should give local businesses incentives to enable their products to compete with imported items.
Meanwhile Dr. Musokotwane said donors have pledged to fulfill their budgetary commitments in next year’s Budget despite the global financial crisis.
Dr Musokotwane said on the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC) television programme, “National Watch” monitored yesterday that donors contributed 25 per cent of Zambia’s national Budget.
He said that because of the global crisis there were fears that donor countries who were most affected would cut their support but most of them had confirmed their contribution.
“So far most donors have indicated that they will fulfill their pledges and the only worry will be about the job losses in the mines,” he said.
He said Zambia should not be scared to attract foreign investment because it accounted for the positive economic trends in countries such as China and Thailand.
“We should not be scared to attract local and foreign investment but we should just ensure that people benefit,” he said.
He said Zambia had not attracted sufficient foreign investment, especially that it came from a “commandist” economy and that since it had a small market the option was to export in order to earn foreign exchange.
He added that Zambia was not the only country that was facing job losses in the mines and the Government was monitoring mines while looking at measures of protecting jobs.
Dr Musokotwane said President Banda recently visited Luanshya Mine because the Government was concerned about the job losses.
He also assured that next year’s Budget would address how Zambia would pull through out of the global financial crisis.
Times of Zambia
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