Political Populism, An impediment to the quality of governance/public policies in Africa.

Inconsistent policies for decades have characterized most of the nation-states in Africa. In Zimbabwe, although the state has tremendous potential, with rich natural resources and one of the most educated populations in Africa, it’s still among the bottom billion states. Most states in Africa, since the turn of the century, have been going through several rounds of an interlocking multi-dimensional crisis characterized by economic collapse, worsening livelihoods, and political polarization. Most economies around the continent have experienced turbulence and in Zimbabwe what remains as a thorn in the flesh of ordinary people is a volatile currency. The new Zimbabwean gold currency (ZiG) has been added to yet another fictitious policy as was with the multi-currency system, the bond note, and the Zimbabwean dollar. These failures are not entirely attributed to the failure of the ruling party but to the quality, capacity, meritocracy, and capabilities of public servants and political actors, particularly the lawmakers. 

This politics and public administration dichotomy has been an essential question within the study and practice of public administration. Firstly noted by Woodrow Wilson in 1887, this dichotomy is premised on the idea that public administration is somehow distinct from politics, and there is a hierarchical (superior-subordinate) relationship between the two. As construed by the dichotomy, politics is about policy making, a set of activities that involve explicit value choices. On the other hand, public administration is an instrument for translating formulated policies into concrete results through applying specialized knowledge and skills, that is, bureaucratic expertise. Although there has been a shift or reforms in public administration, from the traditional to New Public Management and recently the New Public Governance. These approaches sought to bring good governance which are developmental strategies and agendas that address the problems of efficiency, development, capacity, accountability, and legitimacy of the state. 

Politics, as a game of who gets what, when, and how, ought to be the part-time profession of every citizen who would protect the rights and privileges of a free man. In post-independent Africa, political leaders opted for strong centralized states to speed up development. Under the justification of developmentalism and unity, most states introduced a one-party state system and further opted for state-owned economies. The impact of this form of governance was simply concentration and centralization of state power into a single-handed strongman.  In Tanzania, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere was very popular and charismatic. His political party, the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) won all seats during the pre-independence elections. Although Tanganyika attained its independence in 1961 based on a multiparty system, Nyerere turned it into a one-party state order in 1965. Nyerere was more popular than his party and due to his populism, he remained head of the state/ government from 1961 to 1985 when he decided to resign from active politics. In Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah was a populist leader while in the case of Zambia, was Kenneth Kaunda popularly known as (KK). Of all the populist leaders in Africa, Nyerere is regarded to date as the father of the nation, and he is respected in the continent as a “man of the people”. Zimbabwe was not an exception as the former President was much more popular than the ruling party itself, to the extent that he failed to have a succession plan for his party until a time he was topped through a military-assisted transition, a typical coup. 

Political populism refers to a political philosophy in which the country’s political elites articulate people’s grievances in ways that appeal to the ordinary, unemployed, and disadvantaged man and woman in the street, but in a manner that only serves their political agenda and goals. The primary goal would be to attain political power and all that comes with it. Thus, populism is about the people but not by the people and for the people. Populist leaders usually distinguish themselves as typical of the masses in a political system. In most cases, political populism is achieved through a combination of strategies such as demagogic policies and eye-catching slogans that seem to reflect the wishes and needs of the people. Populist leaders and their surrogates become even more well-known through the use of media and opinion polls. This is more critical, especially in countries where ignorance and poverty hamper most people to the extent that they take media and polls as givens.

In Africa's context, populist leaders across the political divide would specify a time to solve what may be considered chronic problems. Normally, they would say, for example, "Within 100 days after being elected I will make sure that poverty is history". Since elites are not typical of the masses, and that they serve the interests of their fellow elites, it is less likely that they succeed in addressing such problems. As a result, when it comes to elections for their second terms, it is difficult for them to sail through the ballot box. This is due to the crisis of underperformance on overambitious projects that were used to solicit votes. It should be understood that in some instances, populists tend to attack foreigners to camouflage their underperformance. For example, in 1972, Idi Amin of Uganda expelled Asians because they were exploiting Ugandans. Similarly, in Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe has constantly used the land issue to label Britain and the United States of America as enemies of Zimbabweans. While I share concerns about the domination of Western countries over the less developed parts of the world particularly Africa, I find that the issue of land and sanctions in Zimbabwe has been misused to legitimize the Harare regime.

The formulation of national economic policy in Zimbabwe is governed by Section 2 (1) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No.20), 2013 which invalidates all secondary and subsidiary legislations deemed to be ultra vires the prescriptions laid down in the Constitution. The critical question in the policy formulation conundrum is the role of political actors and in the Zimbabwean situation, the cabinet, legislature, and judiciary are responsible for making national policies. Public policy is a course of action to be taken by a political party voted into power in democratic governance systems by a majority of the electorate to form a government whose responsibility would be to fulfill the needs of the people. The ZANU PF government in this case led by Emmerson Mnangagwa has the sole responsibility to formulate public policy with the help of parliament which is less dominated by the opposition CCC members.  

However, do the lawmakers know their duties and responsibilities or they are state enablers? Do they understand that they are the voice of the voiceless, and state watchdogs?  Do they understand that their role is legislating in Parliament, representing their riding and political parties, ideologies, and policies, and serving their constituents? A capable Member of Parliament (MP) responds to the grievances of his/her constituents, represents the interests of the people, capable of proposing, debating, and voting on legislation. Able to engage in committee work, and speak on matters of national, local, and international importance such as climate change, carbon taxes, global political economy, geopolitics, and local development initiatives. Do we have these calibers of MPs across the political divide, or there is a bunch of sleepiest, non-cooperative, and ideologically bankrupt individuals who are looking for food handouts and a career in politics? The crisis in Zimbabwe is embedded in these individuals who are enablers of state capture, corruption, and mismanagement of public resources. Thus, leave the people to their own fate without representation in the law-making body of the state.