Renowned economist and currency expert, Professor Steve Hanke of Johns Hopkins University has advised ZANU PF leader Emmerson Mnangagwa to adopt the strategy of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s first prime minister.
By Bvumavaranda Technocrat| There will never ever be another Singapore again, and Zimbabwe’s ZANU(PF) party makes it an absolute certainty that Zimbabwe does not even have a remote chance of emulating Singapore. I am saying this based on a number of irrefutable facts:
1. Singapore was a huge beneficiary of the Cold War dynamics. The West was Hell-bent on stopping the advancement of Communism. Singapore, Japan and South Korea were considered warfronts. Vietnam became the battlefield.
The Cold War ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union. It means Zimbabwean cannot benefit from a global tension that does not exist anymore. Even if there was a similar global flare up, ZANU(PF)’s ideological pronouncements, which are rendered worthless by the shocking capitalist avarice of its leadership, rules out Zimbabwe as a beneficiary.
Furthermore, Zimbabwe does not have the same strategic value that Singapore had to the American global interests. Zimbabwe is a landlocked country with nothing of value to America’s grand scheme. Truth be said, Zimbabwe is so poor Amazon or Microsoft or Apple can buy it many, many times over and not even feel a pinch.
2. Singapore benefitted from America’s Vietnam War. Simply put, Singapore acted as an extension of America and, thereby, reaped great financial and economic rewards. Like I stated above, Zimbabwe is valueless to America. In a discussion with my good friend, Dr Makombe Claudius, he brought up the torrid time Saudi Arabia is getting over the horrendous murder of Kashoggi in Turkey. America gets a lot of crude of from Saudi Arabia. In addition to that, the Saudis have invested a lot of money in American enterprises. A notable number of Silicon Valley companies feast from the Saudi feeding trough.
Apart from the money and the oil, Saudi Arabia is important to America. The Saudis are looked upon as the counterbalance to Iranian interests in the region. This is on the eastern flank of Arabian Peninsular. To the West, the Saudis guarantee the safety of the Red Sea shipping lanes located west of the peninsular. The Western nations are not saying anything about the atrocities taking place in Yemen for a reason. Yemen is considered the battleground for the combat between sectarian rivals in the Islamic world.
In spite of all these significant values, America and the West have publicly protested the Saudi barbarity in the Kashoggi Case. Poor Zimbabwe, where does she feature on this stage?
3. Singapore has taken advantage of shady financial deals by tinpot dictators of the Third World working in connivance with Western banking corporations. Lee Kwan Yew, the founding father of the city state, made sure that Singapore had a financial sector, particularly banking, that institutional bankers trusted. Bankers want to make sure their money is safe. Lee put in place measures to that effect.
When it comes to Zimbabwe’s financial sector, one has to define it first since neither the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) nor the Ministry of Finance seem not to know what we truly have. From the look of it, we have banking executives who think that the custodianship of the depositers’ money gives them the right to freely take the money. The executives appear to behave as if they own the money, and can do as they please with it. Zimbabwean depositers have been swindled without mercy. The looters have gotten away with robbery. It is said the best way to rob a bank is to own one, precisely what Obert Mpofu did. The clever crooks in Zimbabwe figured out an easier path than owning a bank; secure a position as an executive so that you can steal from the poor with complete impunity.
Bank executives know that they can abuse poor Zimbabwean depositers since the executives know fully well that they have the government on a leash and completely pacified with some of the filthy lucre. The bankers have allowed the government to participate in the grand larceny. It was none other than Robert Mugabe who openly said so. Speaking at a rally in Bindura, he told us that the government can no longer go to the banks to get money because companies and individuals have stopped depositing their money in the banks. Here we were told that the government was simply taking the depositers’ money for the sake of running the nation. The owners of the money had no say in that one. As far as getting that money back, the depositers can simply forget about it!
The fact that we have crooks and liars in full control of our government and financial sector kills even the slightest notion that Zimbabwe can replicate what Singapore has accomplished. No sane person will put any money in a Zimbabwean bank.
4. Lastly, Singapore is politically stable. The stability is a function of the booming economy. Zimbabwe is politically dead. It is a zombie nation, a nation of the walking dead run by a government of the walking dead. Zimbabwe is literally a political graveyard. Such a state of affairs can only be good for morticians and grave diggers. Zimbabwe is not Singapore, and will never come anywhere near Singapore for as long as ZANU(PF) is around.
Do I see promising congruities between Zimbabwe and Singapore? You bet, I do! However, I shall keep this to myself until the right time comes!