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2010 budget is full of economic twaddle, charges Prof Chirwa

2010 budget is full of economic twaddle, charges Prof Chirwa
By Ernest Chanda and Lambwe Kachali
Thu 05 Nov. 2009, 04:01 CAT

MMD presidential aspirant Professor Clive Chirwa has observed that the 2010 budget is full of economic twaddle with which Zambians could not afford to be fed.

In an interview, Prof Chirwa described it as the most awful budget ever presented to the Zambian people.

“I have now for the third time read the complete 2010 budget speech delivered to Parliament by his honourable the minister of finance Dr Musokotwane. Every time I read it, I tried to search for the big picture, the vision, the route to prosperity, the signature for jobs creation and poverty eradication, the so- called diversification, the real fruit that will ripe in 2010 and beyond,” UK based Prof Chirwa observed.

“To my profound disappointment, what I found were traps; to be specific, ditches into which Zambia was sinking in as the economic drivers to prosperity are not followed to the book. As a result enforced retardation which is taking us to medieval existence is thrown into our faces. Surely Zambia is better than this. What are we being exposed to and fed? Surely not this economic twaddle which has missed the ethos of developing a balanced national budget that is progressive and not suicidal.”

Prof Chirwa said Dr Musoskotwane missed the point by professing defunct ideas in his budget.

“To me, despite this being from my party that is in government, I find this short-changed presentation of information that has not used the enormous library of research output in economics available around the world difficult to swallow. I do not want to make this personal, as I know Dr Musokotwane as a good economist who can really make a change to Zambia. But I am amazed at how he is missing the most fundamental principles in economics,” he said.

“He is re-writing the rules of economics to profess defunct ideas that will not, even in a single iota move Zambia to the promised land where poverty is eradicated, education is there to propel and underpin the labour force, health is championed to protect the nation, job creation is enforced and in the end improve productivity and GDP. Many of these elements apart from education have been somehow deliberately abandoned in the 2010 budget or so it reads.”

He said the 2010 budget had no tools to develop agriculture and tourism which could boost the country’s economy.

“I should stress that agriculture and tourism are extremely vital for our national development in the sense that we need abundant food not to starve and we need forex input from the visitors to Zambia. To deliver these, Executive decisions must be made as to how we are going to achieve the goals in creating food mountains and attracting tourists.

The current budget 2010 has not got the tools to deliver despite the money being thrown at the two activities. Planning for the future must be done now when our economy and that of our external markets are in the downturn. Zambia is a country that has a great future, if only strategic planning of the country’s endeavours are formulated for real national change and not for personal gains,” Prof Chirwa said.

He said there was also no meaningful outline of developing Zambia’s manufacturing industry.

“In some of my previous writings, I have shown based on statistical evidence, economic proficiency and enormous library of knowledge from both developed and developing countries that the only way to take Zambia from the brink of extinction is to build an industrialised nation propped by manufacturing. Why I have been adamant for the government to create prime industries and let the supply chain be private is for the simple reason of dictating our own development,” Prof Chirwa said.

“Read my lips once more and now a hundred times, no investor will bring money to this country for Zambia’s development, but for profits. As a capitalist, this tells me that investors will always choose quick-buck-return enterprises with little complications and fast exits in case the investments go sour. We have already experienced this in the current economic downturn, where Zambians have been unceremoniously dumped on unemployment tip.”

Prof Chirwa said next year’s budget does not give solutions to unemployment. He said it was also not true that agriculture and tourism were the big job creators in our economy.

“Money has been invested in tourism and agriculture but without a plan. To be blunt these two are not big job creators, as I will show in a minute. My government has taken the eyes off the ball and we know the consequences thereof – increased poverty, uneducated and unhealthy nation, and above all we are seeing with our own eyes a rapid back move to medieval times when agriculture was the main source of national income. Sometimes we as people must rise above politics for the sake of all Zambians.

Let us build a better life for all. To do that we as people must first and for most create real wealth through industrial revolution and then through tourism and agriculture fibres which are second and third in line of development in many countries,” he said.

He advised the government to look at the income generating role tourism could play, rather than just pumping money into the sector without proper plans.

“Let us now look at tourism; this can be a good source of income but it is passive. That means you sit and wait for your next client, hence you have no control in direct planning. But if properly planned, tourism can be a formidable money-spinner for Zambia. However, the 2010 budget does not address the income generation part tourism can bring. By just pumping money into it without a clear outcome planning is the same as throwing money on fire.

The simple question I have to the people who decided to put money in tourism is why invest in new tourist centres when the mother Zambia icon – the mighty Victoria Falls – is just 0.01 per cent developed?” he asked. “If you are an entrepreneur and your main business has developed less that one per cent, surely you cannot start using the meagre finances you have into developing new businesses. This is suicidal. What you will do is to find out how you can realise the full potential of your business and tap into the 99 per cent, which is still unexplored.

For me the development of the North circuit is ill-advised and has started at a wrong time because of the attractions being so spaced and expensive to develop the infrastructure. Livingstone town and its attraction to foreign visitors is a magnet. However, it is currently a tourist destination by name only and not by deeds.”

He said the government should consider establishing a national airline because it is a major player in the tourism industry.

“We need a national airline urgently to maximise our tourist potential. By going to the North circuit without proper airways and railways is catastrophic and not the route that will turn our economy round as claimed,” said Prof Chirwa.

Last month, Dr Musokotwane unveiled a K16.71 trillion budget for next year but retained the 2009 theme of Enhancing Growth through Competitiveness and Diversification aimed at economic diversification

Labels: 2010 BUDGET, BUDGET, CLIVE CHIRWA, MMD

posted by MrK @ 6:47 AM