A presentation to the
Transparency International-Zimbabwe Ethics and Accountability Forum on the
Annual State of Corruption Report
Thursday 25 June 2015,
Sapes Trust Seminar Room, Harare.
By Takura Zhangazha*
Cde Chairlady, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Let me begin by thanking Transparency International Zimbabwe
(TIZ) for inviting me to share some reflections on their very important Annual
Corruption Report for 2014. Especially because
this report focuses on the functions and ethical (or lack of it) conduct of our
state owned enterprises or as we have been wont to call them, parastatals.
This a report that is both interesting and depressing because
it correctly depicts the reality that all is not well in the 78 or so SOEs that
operate in the country. From its summation of the manner in which salary scales
for chief executive officers were borderline ridiculous, unclear tender
procedures through to its articulation of lack of accountability and
transparency this report sets out a daunting task for policy makers and members
of the public to rectify these unfortunate anomalies in how SOEs are managed.
An important aspect that however emerges from the report is
that of the structural challenge of how SOEs are managed. The key question
around this touches on the problems of political interference, militarisation
and multiple regulation of parastatals by different line ministries. These
essential challenges of SOE administration, and as correctly cited in the
report under consideration invariably lead to a lack of transparency and
corruption.
It is these structural challenges around SOEs that I would
like to focus on in this brief presentation. By doing so, I am aware that there
are key ideological questions at play where and when it concerns
parastatals. Their role in relation to
statecraft or development fall largely within the ambit of two key schools of
thought. These being the ‘free market’
or liberal economics and alternatively that of a state controlled
economic framework. The latter is often times referred to disparagingly as
either socialism or communism.
In Zimbabwe’s specific case,
and as outlined in the report, the history of our parastatals derives in
part from the legacy of the settler state which established same said entities
to protect minority privileges and services but within the context of a liberal
economy. In the post independence era,
these SOEs were then primed to begin to serve a majority but within the context
of the then declared socialist or state centric ideological ambit.
This soon gave way, with the advent of the economic
structural adjustment (saps) to the commercialized or semi-privatised version
of parastatal. (There was some privatization of SOEs, for example Dairiboard
and Cotton Company of Zimbabwe) It is
this hybrid model that informs a majority of existent parastatals today.
In the recommendations outlined by the authors of the report,
it is posited that in order to circumvent the culture of corruption that
informs these SOE’s, there is need for a structural realignment of the
regulatory framework to make it not only singular but also independently
managed. Other recommendations which are more options than hard and fast
include those of learning from the experiences of China and Singapore,
privatizing the SOEs, legislative changes, raising the costs of corruption and
further training on accountability for employees of these entities.
These recommendations are very much in order and would, if
implemented, go a long way in curtailing corruption not only in SOEs but also
in our society as a whole.
The key question that however remains unanswered is that of
the ideological framework. It is imperative
that we understand that the hybrid version of commercialized parastatals is
what has been one of the primary causes of the endemic levels of such
corruption. It is a model that neither serves the best public service interest
nor promotes the profit and self sustenance models that many free market
advocates would want to see becoming a reality.
Government, in using the commercialization model sought to
combine both the profit motive with the public interest motive. The end result
has been runaway boards and chief executives that apart from giving themselves
perks have also failed to make any of the entities stay afloat let alone
successful.
It would, in my view, be critical that we begin to look at
the SOEs, as an extension of the obligation of the state to provide services in
a manner akin to the generic social contract.
This would entail a social democratic perspective which would be
characterized by understanding our local context and applying models that
primarily seek to serve the best public interest. Simultaneously, a baseline as
to the state’s obligation to keep these services going in the public interest
is of paramount importance. The guiding principles must be that everyone must
have access to basic services such as water, electricity, transport, education
and health. For those SOEs that are in the extractive industry sector, there
must be an accountability framework that not only circumvents corruption but
that explains how resources acquired and sold for a profit feed into a
symbiotic sustainability cycle for all other public services.
It would also require that we take a step back and identify
what has been missing from the liberal economic and socialist (for lack of a
better phrase) frameworks. In this, I am
confident that we will see that we have been pandering to global solutions that
have been crippled by limited application to local context. The lack of
sustained public pressure on the glaring levels of corruption would be further
indicative of the fact that our country’s citizens are not aware of the values
that SOEs are informed by. They tend to view them as part and parcel of the
general state and private entity tendency toward corruption and lack of
accountability.
So we need to act on imbuing a sense of democratic public
interest service to our parastatals that goes beyond the legal and builds a
broader democratic culture of accountability.
This would mean the panacea would not be wholesale
privatization/commercialization or re-nationalizing of the SOEs but to
demonstrate their primary necessity in the process of providing goods and
services to the majority poor in our society.
That way, accountability would then become part and parcel of
expectations of service with citizens going out of their way to defend these
SOEs against corruption of any kind.
We have to keep the public service element intact within
these SOEs. This can be done by, as correctly recommended in the report,
looking at internal accountability mechanisms, professionalization and
independence of those selected to be at their helm and democratic decision
making as to the efficacy of their privatization or commercialization.
Where we fail to do so, the ‘public’ and ‘public’ interest
will be lost to the SOEs and the elite will continue to not only abuse these
parastatals but also protect each other and their roles in them.
ENDS//
Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity
(takura-zhangazha.blogspot.com)
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