Moyo pleads with exiles to return home

via Moyo pleads with exiles to return home | SW Radio Africa by Tichaona Sibanda on Monday, June 2, 2014

Simon Khaya Moyo, the ZANU PF senior Minister of State, has urged Zimbabweans in the diaspora to return home and participate in rebuilding the country’s economy.

Speaking last week at a meeting organised by the Zimbabwe Congress of Students Unions at Harare Polytechnic, Moyo said individuals in foreign lands had a role to play in economic development.

‘You go in the SADC region, it’s Zimbabweans who are running the economies of those countries and beyond. In Europe it’s you people who are there and can you imagine if we say come back all of you and let us now address all our challenges.

‘This is going to be something else in this country and we shall be moving also in that direction to make sure that those in the Diaspora come back and make the situation attractive in the sense that they must feel that they have got a duty to contribute to our economic development,’ said Moyo.

He continued: ‘So if you have got any relative outside, please tell them to get ready to come back home because we need them so that Zimbabwe can move ahead.’

However social commentator Matthew Nyashanu told SW Radio Africa on Monday that Moyo’s rallying call is laughable, coming from a man whose party forced millions of Zimbabweans into exile.

‘What has changed in Zimbabwe that can attract the people who left because of dire economic and political problems? Things have gone from bad to worse and in the last eight months alone, thousands more have left the country,’ Nyashanu explained.

He said ZANU PF must return to the rule of law and improve on its democratic record as a signal that they are ready to do things differently.

‘Any country that has sound economic policies and respects human rights will attract skilled workers. You don’t need to call them but they will come on their own volition,’ added Nyashanu.

It is estimated that there are between three and four million Zimbabweans in exile today, with many of them experts in various fields. Analysts point out that Zimbabwe is a country that has a large percentage of its active population in exile, because of the economic insecurity back home.