Increasingly ours is a bi-polar world. At the one end of the spectrum we have 20 per cent of the worlds population, living in countries where the income per capita is about US$15 000 per annum. In Zimbabwe dollar terms that is Z$1 275 000 a year or Z$3 500 a day. OK, I know that in these countries the cost of living is about three times the cost of living in a poor country, but it is still a lot of money. Its 88 times the wage of our domestic servant and 40 times the minimum wage in industry and mining in Zimbabwe. It’s 150 times the average income of the 40 per cent of our total population who live in the peasant or communal farming districts.

But it’s not just the average incomes that apply in these "rich" countries. It’s also the quality and level of services that come from the State. Walk into a school in these countries and see the facilities now taken for granted. My first response to a visit to Europe was one of astonishment – there were no poor people in sight. I now know that that is not true, there are poor people in Europe but compared to where I come from, everyone looked rich. I am always amazed also at the level of unemployment benefits that are paid as a routine in many of these countries. I know people who have never worked and yet now have homes, cars and children. The people who live in these countries are mobile, well educated, use credit cards (I have never owned one) and communicate across the world with amazing speed. They will live their three score and ten years and expect to do so in comparative security. The level of choice open to such people is just staggering to those of us who live in the third world.

Then there are the rest of us – the 80 per cent who live probably at about 5 per cent of the above standard on average at an income of about US$700 per annum. I know this varies a great deal – both up and down but on average across the world this is probably what you might expect in the developing countries. We are not getting richer and our populations are growing faster so that our conditions of poverty are not being addressed despite all the effort that is being made to do so. What is worse is that as the world economy globalizes and new forms of economic activity take precedence, our people become more and more marginalised. Our schools simply cannot prepare the children they are teaching for a new technologically driven world. They struggle to give them the basics.

It is of grave concern to all of us who have responsibility for policy formulation as to how we are going to somehow break the cycle of poverty and ignorance. How to bridge the gap between the rich and the poor in the world? Of particular concern are the absolutely poor – about 1,2 billion people who live on less than a US dollar a day – and often much less.

This group lives every day on the edge of starvation, go to bed hungry most days and live in crowded and unsanitary conditions. They often sleep rough and have little or no privacy. Their life expectancy is half the world average and declining. Women are the majority in this group and are the most disadvantaged. 50 per cent or more of their children die before they turn 5 and those that survive get little or no education. A significant proportion end up as virtually slaves in the societies in which they live, with little or no choice about anything concerned with their lives. They simply cannot imagine what it is like to sleep in a bed and go to a supermarket with a little piece of plastic that allows you to buy a king’s ransom in goods and food.

Under Mugabe, Zimbabwe has seen a massive and unprecedented decline in living standards and in the quality of life enjoyed by the average citizen. Since 1990 our average incomes have declined 70 per cent in real terms, life expectancy has plummeted 10 years and all social services have deteriorated to the point where they can barely operate, let alone deliver. While the people in the subsistence sector have not experienced such dramatic declines in their living standards, they must now care for dependents from urban society. Whereas in the past the cities created surpluses which were sent home to help make life a bit easier. The time when a family in the rural areas would send a son away to the city to earn a living and send money home is almost over. The urban poor have borne the brunt of the economic downturn and are worse off than at any time in the past century.

The dramatic advances of the first decade of independence – and there were many including an explosion of education and health services and great advances in urban g housing and in rural productivity, have all been lost and reversed by mounting corruption and poor governance. The educated elite we created in those years are now leaving the country and exercising the mobility our education system gave them. They send money home, but its crumbs off the table and can only alleviate the absolute poverty of the families they left behind.

The paradox of this situation is that at the same time as this was happening to the great majority, a minority has been accumulating wealth on a scale not seen in the previous century. A visit to Borrowdale in Harare or any of the other high-income suburbs reveals huge houses, many of which resemble hotels. These have every facility and are luxuriously fitted out. The occupants do not seem to be short of anything and send their children to the best schools and universities. They take overseas holidays and drive luxury vehicles. The disparity between this and the situation in the townships is pornographic and inexplicable. Where is this new money coming from? Real estate agents tell of clients paying for large properties in cash and it is evident that much of the money is not legal. But its also true and has been the case in many countries in earlier centuries that absolute poverty often resides with great wealth for a tiny minority. Europe is full of examples of this historical situation.

The questing then is not only how do we eliminate absolute poverty but also how do we create a more equitable society? I think there are two key elements – education and the economic empowerment of the individual. Lets look at these in the Zimbabwe context.

We need to revisit our education system and to strive to upgrade it to the point where it can deliver to every child, irrespective of their circumstances, a world class basic education that will unlock their potential and open doors of opportunity – not only to further education but also to economic opportunities. This is possible but it requires a rescheduling of our priorities – less spending on the military and more on education, treating our teachers as valued professionals who are doing a key job and should be paid as such. The world community – the rich countries have an obligation to help us achieve this within the next decade and to hold it there.

Secondly we need to give people control over the basic resources they need to live – urban housing on a freehold basis and security of tenure over the land the rural poor cultivate. Take them out of the hands of greedy exploitative landlords and corrupt local authorities and free them from the shackles of their traditional systems of land tenure. The MDC is the first mass political movement in Africa (we have over 2,5 million members) to commit itself to this goal. A nation of home owners and independent farmers who own their own land, would be a nation that could call its leaders to account and would not tolerate the nonsense we have witnessed in this country over the past decade. Don’t tell me it cannot be done – it can be and we have the resources to make it happen and fast. It’s only a question of commitment.

Eddie Cross

12th March 2001.

Please note that this note is personal and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Movement for Democratic Change.