eBusiness Weekly
Thupeyo Muleya
The quest to boost productivity in local industries and to grow the national economy has seen Zimbabwe, like other progressive nations across the globe, coming up with a raft of measures to remove trade barriers to improve the movement of goods and people within its borders.
In 2014, Cabinet approved the setting up of the National Ports Authority (NPA) that would be co-ordinating the operations and attending to teething challenges at the port of entries. Presently, the Attorney General’s (AG) office is reportedly seized with the legal process leading to the full implementation of the NPA dream.
Under the new order, the NPA will fall under the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure Development, charged with the running of all the country’s entry and exit points. Such a port authority will deal with operations, administrative, security and health among other issues.
Currently any department can implement their own programmes at the country’s borders, but usually at the expense of important stakeholders including travellers and importers. Some of the stakeholders at the ports of entry include: the Department of Immigration, Insurance companies, Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra), police, ministries of Health, Environmental Management Authority, Forestry Commission, Transport, Veterinary Services and Agriculture among other security agencies.
In most cases people are finding it difficult to raise issues of concern in a set up where there is no one in charge or overall responsible for border operations. It is also believed that the NPA will attend to — among other issues — the expansion and upgrading of the border infrastructure and also put systems in place which would make Zimbabwe an ideal trade partner.
The availability of key infrastructure at Beitbridge is key to the successful implementation of the One Stop Border initiative with South Africa. At the moment the border post is in a sorry state and efforts to rehabilitate the place by Zimra since 2001 are yet to bear fruits.
The new political dispensation under the stewardship of President Mnangagwa has adopted robust policies to stimulate economic growth through the “Zimbabwe is Open for Business” initiative.
As part of the initiative (opening up for business), Government has engaged ZimBorders to mordernise Beitbridge into a commercial hub at a cost of $241 million.
The Head of State and Government has since laid the foundation to pave way for civil works at the country’s and Sadc’s busiest inland port. Some of the works under the modernisation programme include the construction of more (commercial) customs offices, paving, and expansion of sewer and water reticulation facilities, separation of traffic into buses, light vehicles, tourists, commercial vehicles, and construction of a commercial bridge to link with South Africa, the upgrading of Beitbridge Municipality’s key infrastructure among others.
As part of accelerating the One-Stop-Border-Post (OSBP), last year South Africa launched a logistics hub in Musina to ease the cost of doing business and promote regional and international trade among Sadc members. The hub is a brainchild of Zimbabweans in the diaspora and is a culmination of a partnership between, Lion Share, Burbey Group, Barloworld, Mac and Transnet.
It is thus critical that the Beitbridge modernisation programme fits into the ideals of the NPA. In addition, the NPA is also encouraged to prioritise channeling part of the funds from Beitbridge Border Post towards the upgrading of the area and completion of other Government programmes stalled by an acute shortage of funds. It is also important for the Ports authority to tap into the Integrated Border Management (IBM) programme which was adopted by Government with the assistance of the International Organisation for Migration in 2016.
Business Weekly is reliably informed that the overall objective of the IBM programme is to contribute to the establishment of a migration governance framework (policy, institutional and legislative) in Zimbabwe.
Such a frame work supports state actors to manage migration in dialogue with non-state actors and in a migrant-centred, gender-sensitive, rights upfront-based and development-oriented manner.
Another critical issue the NPA should urgently look at is the implementation of the OSBP concept between Zimbabwe and South Africa at Beitbridge, which was initiated by Sadc in 2006. In the same year, the Common Market for East and Central Africa (Comesa) identified the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia (Chirundu Border Post) for a similar initiative. However, Comesa translated their plans into action at Chirundu on 5 December, 2009. The harmonisation of operations at Chirundu has simplified the way of doing business.
Sadly the dream has been proving elusive at Beitbridge due to a number of challenges, among them bureaucracy by both Zimbabwean and South Africa authorities. The unavailability of adequate infrastructure has been cited as one of the hindrances to the concept.
The lack of a ports authority on the part of Zimbabwe has been the greatest undoing to the takeoff of the noble initiative.
Under the OSBP travelers are cleared once for passage into either country. At the moment travellers have to queue twice for the same clearance processes to leave or enter Zimbabwe or South Africa.
It will also be very critical for the NPA to look into issues of rampant pollution at the border where only the export side is paved — is a ticking health time bomb, with border officials on the arrival commercial section and over 2 000 residents living directly on the west of the border at risk of contracting TB and other diseases.
In addition to carbon toxics coming from vehicles, there is a lot of fine dust coming (rising) from this area 24 hours a day, as haulage trucks, buses and other vehicular traffic navigate through the border post.
Most people and business in Limpopo view suburb hardly open windows, despite the town’s high temperatures for fear of inhaling fine dust coming from that part of the world.
Besides the border post, the town’s major water treatment plant is also located 1km west of the port and is not exempt from pollution.
