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SENATE HANSARD 18 MAY 2022 VOL 31 NO 43

PARLIAMENT OF ZIMBABWE

Wednesday, 18th May, 2022

The Senate met at Half-past Two o’clock p.m.

PRAYERS

(THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE in the Chair)

THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE: Hon. Senators, why is it that the House is almost empty? We complain about the Ministers but we do the same. People cannot lie to me saying they are virtually connected. I talked about this some other time ago that first, you have to check whether the House is full, not just stay in a hotel and login then we think you are there. Before we complain, I think we have to be organised ourselves.

MOTION

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Madam President, I move that Orders of the Day, Numbers 1 to 5 be stood over until Order of the Day Number 14 has been disposed of.

Motion put and agreed to.

SECOND READING

AMENDMENT OF STATE UNIVERSITIES BILL [H. B. 13, 2021]

Sixth Order read: Second Reading: Amendment of State Universities Statutes Bill [H. B. 13, 2021].

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Thank you Madam President. With your permission, I have got handouts of my presentation because the electronics are not working, so I have printed for the Hon. Members of the Senate including yourself.

THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE: Thank you.

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Madam President, please allow me to start by premising the start of our presentation on Section 13 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 20) Act 2013 (hereinafter referred to as “the Constitution”)...

ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE

CHALLENGES WITH INTERNET CONNECTIVITY

THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE: Please, before you continue Hon. Minister, I have a notice.

Please, be advised that we have a challenge with our main internet link service provider TelOne. They have a technical connectivity challenge. Internet will be connected to the backup link during Parliament sittings. Any inconvenience caused is deeply regretted. We are sorry about that. You can proceed Hon. Minister.

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Thank you very much. Madam President, please allow me to start by premising the start of our presentation on Section 13 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 20) Act 2013 (hereinafter referred to as “the Constitution”) which focuses on national development. Subsection 1 of Section 13 states that “The State and all institutions and agencies of Government at every level must endeavour to facilitate rapid and equitable development and in particular, must take measures to (a) promote private initiative and self-reliance (b) foster agricultural, commercial, industrial, technological and scientific development and (c) foster the development of industrial and commercial enterprises in order to empower Zimbabwean citizens”.

His Excellency, the President of the Republic of Zimbabwe, Dr. Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa pronounced that our national vision is to become an upper middle-income economy or better by 2030 in compliance with the requirements of Section 13 of the Constitution on national development, among others. Thus our National Strategic intent is rapid and equitable development through Vision 2030. Madam President, it is imperative that all Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies must play their part to achieve this vision by providing the required and necessary national capabilities. National capabilities can only be achieved when the relevant national systems are properly configured.

His Excellency, the President further stated that this vision will be fulfilled through leadership in knowledge and innovation. To this end, our contribution as Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Innovation, Science and Technology Development (MHTEISTD) is to ensure Zimbabwe becomes an innovation-led and knowledge driven economy by 2025 as espoused in NDS1. Madam President, this provides an important background and context of our presentation today. To this end, please allow me to explain further on our mission to make higher education relevant for national development as required by the Constitution.

Madam President, please allow me to state the simple truism that no nation can develop faster than the development of its education system, particularly the objectives of that education system. To this end, a national development cycle can be summarised as a tight and inseparable logical combination and flow between human needs, the education system and industrialisation or industry. A good education system, particularly the curricula must be empathetic to and therefore drive from (2) human needs and by being the means for devising solution to provide for these human needs, the education system must, by design, lead to the development of (3) an industry that facilitates rapid and sustainable provisions for that human needs as required by the Constitution. 

On Fig 2, we are showing that humans need food, water, shelter, sleep, connection or communication and innovation.  Therefore, when we design our education system, it must be informed by what our people need and industry is a repetitive way of producing the goods that would have been designed by an education system for the provision of human needs.  Therefore, it is this triangle that must be respected whenever we are designing an education system.  It is education for who, to meet whose needs and does that education produce the industry that is needed to provide for those human needs?

Our strategy or game plan is to cause national development which can be summarised as industrialisation and modernisation using well configured national systems and processes to work on our heritage.  In other words, when our education system is configured in such a way that it works on our heritage, which means our natural resources that we had and our people, it can only lead to rapid and equitable national development. 

On Fig 3, we are summarising this talk to say for a nation to develop, which is the output of industrialisation and modernisation.  We have to be properly arranged in terms of our processes, which is the configuration of our processes.  Our processes must be based on what we have as a people and as a nation in terms of our heritage, hence when we work on our heritage which is like our minerals and we are able to do it through well configured processes, we can industrialise our country. 

Madam President, it is in order to fulfill the constitutional requirement on national development that Zimbabwe had to configure its Higher and Tertiary Education Policy from Education 3.0 which was focusing on teaching, research and community service to heritage based Education 5.0, which is focused on teaching, research and community service, innovation and industrialisation by making our education conform to the Constitution and through making it Education 5.0, we could ensure rapid and equitable national development.  

On Fig 4, we are showing Education 3.0 which is teaching, research and community service and never working on our heritage so that we produce an industry.  By adding innovation and industrialisation, our intention is very clear in that we are saying our education must lead to something because all the industries that we see in this world are a result of innovation of education systems in those areas.  So, our overall aim is this transformation to make Zimbabwe’s education curve dominate the technology curve.  We provided Fig 5, which shows two curves; the blue curve is what we call the technology curve and the golden curve is what we call the education curve. 

Now we want to describe what suffering is, which is social pain.  Whenever your education is below the development of technology elsewhere, it is a period of social pain.  It means if your education cannot produce the industry that you need, you will suffer but if you make your education produce the industry you do not suffer.  So, our job is to make sure that education causes the industry.  I will give you an example, when we are dominating the technology curve we will be able to tell if a bus breaks down.  We will just make another one.  If our crops fail, we will just irrigate them and ensure we have food.  It means if our education is able to make our technology we do not suffer.  The colonial education system was not teaching us to make the technology, therefore our education curve was always below the technology curve.  So, we were always using words such as we shall import this or buy this, meaning it was produced by an education system elsewhere.  What we are intending to do is the blue dot which is called prosperity which can only occur when your education system is dominating the kind of technology you will use.  This is basically the way we can make our education conform to the constitutional dictates of Section 30.  Universities play a crucial role in this regard.  Once we are able to make our university education dominate the technology curve, we transition from social pain to prosperity thereby leading to the facilitation of rapid and equitable development as envisaged by Section 30 of the Constitution.  We must make our ploughs, cars, food and must be able to purify our water, make our medicine and at that moment, our education is dominating the technology and we cannot talk about suffering but prosperity.

The amendment of these statutes follow the amendment that you did for the Manpower Planning and Development Act, which is a principal Act and all these university Acts have to conform to that Act which is to align the State Universities Act with the Constitution, especially that Section 30 and making their provision with regards to administration more uniform while maintaining and strengthening their different founding statutory missions.  Each of our universities has a mission, for example Lupane State University is supposed to be specialising in dry land agriculture technology.  National University of Science and Technology is supposed to be leading in science and technology.  Gwanda State University is supposed to be leading us in terms of agricultural technology and mining technology.  So each university will maintain its focus but the way we administer them in terms of the structuring of the administration has to be the same. We also want to bring the State Universities mission objectives into line with the need for the 21st century university function as agents of industrialisation and modernisation agenda, and herein expressed as a Government of Zimbabwe Education 5.0 policy direction, which is conforming to the national Constitution Section 30, where education is to be national development outcome based.  We do not want an education whereby people finish and still look for jobs.  We believe when we have educated people, they should be the job provider. We want an education with a focus on the production of goods and services, thus fostering industrialisation and modernisation.  This has already been enshrined in the Manpower Planning and Development Act, Chapter 28:02 as amended and we are now therefore proposing to put all State Universities Acts into line with this constitutional requirement, thereby increasing efficiency and economy in the functioning of University Councils by reducing their size while making them more balanced with regard to gender and regional representation, in line with Sections 9 (2) and 194 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe.  In the meantime, some of our university councils have numbers of 60 and some even 80 like the Senate, so we must make sure that we conform to the Constitution by making them efficient.  We want to make uniform the way some designated or senior university administration officers are appointed across all universities in terms of administration.  Also to strengthen and where not clear, make explicit principles of good governance and streamline State universities disciplinary procedures in line with the demands of Section 61(1) (c) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe on Academic Freedom.  We know that academic freedom is talking about universities being allowed to be creative and not be disturbed in their creativity.

Specifically, the amendment of State Universities Statutes Bill seeks to amend the following thirteen State Universities Acts:

  1. Bindura University of Science Education Act [Chapter 25:22];
  2. Chinhoyi University of Technology Act [Chapter 25:23];
  3. Gwanda State University Act [Chapter 25:30];
  4. Harare Institute of Technology Act [Chapter 25:26];
  5. Lupane State University Act [Chapter 25:25];
  6. Manicaland State University of Applied Sciences Act [Chapter 25:31];
  7. Marondera University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology Act [Chapter 25:29];
  8. Masvingo State University Act [Chapter 25:24];
  9. Midlands State University Act [25:21];
  10. National University of Science and Technology Act [Chapter 25:13];
  11. Pan African Minerals University Act [Chapter 25:33];
  12. University of Zimbabwe Act [Chapter 25:16]; and
  13. Zimbabwe Open University [Chapter 25:20].

The Constitution ushered in the promotion of good corporate governance, gender balance and regional representation. This necessitated a process of entrenching these and other progressive principles into the existing laws in order for the laws to be intra vires with the supreme law of the land and to improve service delivery in universities.

Furthermore, innovation and industrialisation are ongoing in compliance with Section 13 of the Constitution, and it is indispensable that the laws speak to innovation and industrialisation of the country, through higher education institutions in compliance with the Constitution.

In this regard, it is also herein proposed that all State University Acts follow the University of Zimbabwe Act model on administration in compliance with Section 61 (1) (c) on academic freedom. The provisions of this Act together with other Acts need to be updated to enhance efficiency and effectiveness as required by the Constitution on matters of basic values and principles governing public administration.

             Principle 1: Good Governance

           In terms of Chapter 9 of the Constitution, all the State institutions, including universities, must conduct their affairs in compliance with principles and values of good governance which include but are not limited to the following: efficiency, competence, accountability, transparency, professional and ethical conduct, financial probity, responsiveness, inclusivity, meritocracy, equality and non-discrimination.

Accordingly, in this regard, it is proposed that all State Universities must be run by lean and efficient councils which are inclusive in terms of gender and regional representation. Trimming numbers in councils resonates with constitutional values of economic use of resources. Section 194 (1) (b) provides for the efficient and economical use of resources. Apart from expending resources, bloated university councils tend to be inefficient and a burden to the fiscus and institutions they lead, without much additional value being realised.

Appointment of members to university councils must be based on merit. This is in line with Section 194 (2) of the Constitution which provides that appointments to offices in all tiers of Government, including Government institutions and agencies and Government controlled entities and other public enterprises, must be made primarily on the basis of merit.

All university councils must develop and adopt approved Council Charters. All university employees must be governed by Codes of Ethics that respect Academic Freedom. All Vice Chancellors must be appointed by the Chancellor for a single five-year term that may be renewable once in line with the Public Entities Corporate Governance [Chapter 10:31] and Section 197 of the Constitution.

The Vice Chancellor and Chairperson of Council be removed from the Finance Committee. This amendment was necessitated by the need to comply with principles of good corporate governance where the Chairman of Council should not chair committee meetings and council at the same time.

The Librarian and Bursar be appointed by the council with the approval of the Minister, to be in line with the University of Zimbabwe Act. There is clarity in the Acts on how the Registrar is appointed but for the Bursar and Librarian, the Acts just say they are appointed in terms of statutes. This amendment seeks to clarify and standardise.

All university disciplinary procedures must be standardised with the constitutional provision of academic freedom and those procedures as regulated by the Labour Act [Chapter 28:01] in order to remove cumbersome and costly procedures.

Principle 2: Gender Balance

Section 17 of the Constitution stipulates that the State must promote full gender balance and that the State must take all legislative measures to ensure that both genders are equally represented in all institutions and agencies of Government. Accordingly, as much as possible, women must constitute at least half the membership of appointed members at all levels in institutions of higher learning. At the moment, all the universities have gender balanced councils, 100% of them. This principle seeks to bring into effect the right to gender balance as stipulated in the Constitution.

Principle 3: Innovation and Industrialisation

The needs of the nation are ever changing. It is vital for University Acts to speak to the said needs of society. Complying to the triangle that I talked about that all what we learn must be to fulfil the needs of the people and all what we learn must lead to an industry which in turn fulfils the needs of the people. In this regard, all University Acts must specify mandates of universities in their objects section in line with the 5.0 education policy focusing on teaching, research, community service, innovation and industrialisation. Education 5.0 seeks to extend the role of universities in national development programmes by ensuring that the heritage-based education system produces quality goods and services for the nation, therefore industrialising and modernising this nation.

The objects section seeks to promote artistic expression, scientific research and creativity in line with section 61(1) (b) of the Constitution. Some absurdities, such as citing some University Acts using old names, for instance, Great Zimbabwe State University is using Masvingo State University Act. It should be cleaned up through the amendment process. As we speak, Great Zimbabwe University is called Masvingo State University. However, inside it is written Great Zimbabwe University, so this is just to clean up.   

Conclusion

The constitutional alignment process is crucial in order to bring the University Acts into line with the Constitution. It is therefore envisaged that once the amendments go through, the Acts will fully be aligned to the Constitution and also that university administration becomes more efficient as required by the Constitution. At the same time, universities become development agencies for this country.

The amendment of the Acts process will also serve to develop and reform the laws governing universities to enable them to address the needs of society in line with changing social, political and economic environment and the desire for the nation to be modernised and industrialised as required by Section 13 of the Constitution. This is just moving the universities from a colonial model to an independent model.

State Universities play a critical role in the industrialisation and modernisation of the nation. The Bill therefore, entrenches the constitutional provision of fostering national development within the constitutional principles of academic freedom which are essential for universities to fulfil their core scholarly mission of seeking truth and advancing knowledge for the purposes of industrialisation and modernisation without undue interference.  Thus, universities perform their business by making their mission empathetic to human needs.  Universities must be there for the people to provide the needs of the people.  They cannot be just there and there which then creates the basis of industry to meet the same human needs as their main guide to service society with regards to rapid and equitable development. 

The so called Silicon Valley that we know today is an industrial park of Stanford University.  The industrialisation of the United States as we know today is a result of MIT and its university.  All the agriculture which is in the United States for example, is done by universities.  I thank you Madam President. I therefore move that the Bill be read a the second time.   

*HON. SEN. TONGOGARA: Thank you Madam President for giving me the opportunity to add my voice.  Firstly, I would like to thank the Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education for the document which shows that they clearly looked at it and identified problems in our education system when they changed that.  Education 3.0 must be replaced by 5.0. Education 5.0 makes children clearly understand what they are learning and how it will help them in future.

I would also want to applaud the Minister for saying that the tertiary students who were in school must go back to school in order to clearly understand what they are learning about and not to aid corruption in their studies.  This will cause problems because some people will be given jobs that they are not qualified to do because they will be related to the managers.

In conclusion, I would like to say that I am very glad about the issue of gender equality which has been included in the document.  Our Constitution says that there should be 50/50 opportunities for both males and females.  Our universities are trying their best to make sure that there is gender equality.  I would also like to thank the Minister for the job well done by ensuring that our country moves forward.  This will reduce the level of unemployment for graduates.  I thank you Mr. President.

*HON. SEN. SHUMBA:  Thank you Mr. President for affording me the opportunity to second what the Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education brought in this House.  This is a good contribution.  I wish if I would turn back the hands of time and go back to university and have this good privilege.  As we were growing up, we only knew that one would go to the university and study a BA degree so that you would teach Shona and Religious studies only.  Thank you Hon. Minister Murwira and your colleagues as you are noticing that we were backward.  I wish this could start at primary level because not everyone can afford to be at university.

I applaud this Bill and that is why people went to war.  They realised that we were disadvantaged.  As we stand here, we have degrees which have no use.  You can bring a lot of degrees on the table but realise that you have nothing to do with them.  You cannot take it to Breton.  It is better if someone has done what is being introduced currently.  We are grateful for the programme, well done Hon. Minister.  I wish this could remain like this forever.

According to the Constitution, there should be 50/50 in terms of gender equality and this is good.  I support the Bill brought by the Minister in this House. 

 (v)HON. SEN. CHIEF MATHUPULA:  Thank you Minister for your presentation.  It covered very important issues. We wish that our students and faculties could be the answer to many problems that we are facing as a society.  They should be the ones to address the parts which are missing on our tractors and servicing of such equipment and many things which need to be imported from out of the country.  So, if they can be the ones who can make these things here locally, it can save us on the import bill and it can create skills. This issue of graduates saying we do not have jobs, they are the ones who are supposed to be creating jobs.  You also spoke about regional representation of our universities, which is very important, but I think the problem that we have is that we are failing to link higher and lower education system such that if you have a university, let us say in Tsholotsho, the students who go there to learn will be coming from the towns.  Look at your universities, they are importing from towns, so our rural schools do not have the infrastructure and the capacity to feed into those universities.  You can talk about representation even in rural areas universities; even if they are there, the students who are learning there are not coming from those areas because of the schools.

You spoke about the colonial aspect; I think it is coming back from the colonial aspect.  So, I wonder how you will manage, maybe your document can speak about that.  If you speak about representation in every region, we need to also look at that representation and see how we can solve that problem of equipping the capacity of those rural areas to feed into your universities.  Thank you so much Hon. Minister for your document, thank you Mr. President.

*HON. SEN. CHINAKE: Thank you Mr. President.  I just want to thank the Hon. Minister for bringing this Bill which is very important so that our country will succeed and our children will do well.  We are grown up and we can no longer go back to school but the country’s future lies in the hands of our children.  The Hon. Minister talked about Education 5.0 in the Bill, how have you ensured that this programme is a success?  Thank you Mr. President.

HON. PROF. MURWIRA: Thank you Mr. President.  I am very humbled by the comments from Hon. Senators which are mainly supportive of the direction of changing our education into something that can transform our lives, transforming this nation from social pain to prosperity through a deliberate design of our systems for effectiveness.  I want to thank Hon. Sen. Tongogara for talking about gender equality and also issues to do with an education that has a purpose.  We say education must have a purpose and a benefit, otherwise if education in this country – we have been witnessing low levels of industrialisation and high levels of literacy, which should never happen.  Education with high levels of literacy, we expect higher levels of industrialisation. It means there was something wrong in this design. This is what this august House is correcting.  I thank you.

I also thank Hon. Sen. Shumba for really emphasising on this point of an education that works for us and not an education that takes money from us and never gives back.  So, we promise that we will keep on working as honestly and humbly as we can to make sure that our country talks a different language, and sits on different tables from the ones it has been sitting before.

Hon. Sen. Chief Mathupula talked about very important issues in terms of the comment of saying the rural schools are not having enough feed into our universities.  We believe that when we have strengthened university education, it means we will also strengthen the type of people who will go into those rural schools because all these teachers are trained in higher education.  Once we have transformed higher education properly, it will in turn transform and benefit what is happening in the rural schools.  I believe by this transformation, we will be able to improve the feed into the universities that is coming from these schools. 

Hon. Sen. Chinake talked about Education 5.0 and we have been talking about it.  This Bill is trying to entrench Education 5.0, although it is entrenched in the Act you already passed, which is the Manpower Planning and Development Act.  These ones are now cleaning up so that they are all aligned to the Manpower Planning and Development Act and so that our education begins to show results. 

Hon. Sen. Chinake, you would know that for example, this country is now able to produce its own oxygen; that is a movement in Education 5.0.  We also know that for example, at Marondera University of Agricultural Science and Technology in Mashonaland East, it is having the largest sophisticated irrigation system that we have just installed which just has to be inaugurated, which is a movement towards that direction.  You would know that all our universities from Lupane State University, which is doing dry-land agriculture, we have now given it enough livestock so that they are able to study about livestock.  We were in a situation whereby people talk about cattle and have a degree on cattle but when they see the cow, they run away.  So these are issues which we are now doing where we want to make sure that our education makes sense and make sure that we teach and not cheat.  We really believe that this movement that you are supporting and we are humbled by that, will transform our country in our lifetime.  We believe that we are laying a foundation that goes beyond ourselves, laying the true independence of this country in terms of mind; a liberated mind leads to a liberated flesh and liberated way of living where the country’s dignity is restored through knowledge.  Hon. Mr. President, I thank you.  I now move that the Amendment of State Universities Statutes Bill be read a second time.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Committee Stage: With leave, forthwith.

COMMITTEE STAGE

AMMENDMENT OF STATE UNIVERSITIES STATUTES BILL [H. B. 13, 2021]

House in Committee.

Clause 1 put and agreed to.

On Clause 2:

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Mr. Chairman, with the leave of the House, we have noted a typographical error on Clause 2, where it is written ‘student union’ but should be corrected to ‘representative council’ not union. I thank you.

Clause 2 put and agreed to.

Clauses 3 and 4 put and agreed to.

Schedule put and agreed to.

House resumed.

Bill reported without amendments.

Third Reading: With leave, forthwith.

THIRD READING

AMENDMENT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITIES STATUTES BILL [H. B. 13, 2021]

THE MINISTER OF HIGHER AND TERTIARY EDUCATION, INNOVATION, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT (HON. PROF. MURWIRA): Mr. President, I move that the Bill be now read the third time.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read the third time.

MOTION

EFFECTS OF DROUGHT ON THE NATIONAL HERD IN THE DRY REGIONS OF THE COUNTRY

     Seventh Order read:  Adjourned debate on the motion on the effects of drought on the national herd in the dry regions of the country.

          Question again proposed.

*HON. SEN. TONGOGARA:  Thank you Mr. President for affording me the opportunity to debate the motion moved by Hon. Sen. Dube concerning drought, which causes our livestock to die due to lack of inadequate grazing land.  I would like to start by saying long ago, drought was rarely experienced because things were alright then.  Trees were green and we were not allowed to cut down fruit trees and the msasa trees.  This was very helpful as people could eat fruits from those trees and they protected people from the winds.  It was rare for roofs to be blown away by winds as the houses were covered by trees.  Currently, you will notice that man are moving around with axes to cut down trees though it took years for the trees to grow to the level they are at but they are easily cut down.  When you hear the reasons for cutting down the trees, you will be surprised.  Some would like to use them in their tobacco barns while others use them for firewood.  This is unbelievable.  As a people, we should play our role of saving these trees as it is also our responsibility to conserve trees.  If people do not know the importance of trees, they find it easy to cut down trees.  I encourage Parliamentarians to visit everyone responsible for tree conservation.  A lot of people reside in rural areas and they are being led by chiefs and they know the consequences for cutting down trees.  It will help if Chiefs lead working with EMA, Forestry Commission and all stakeholders who are responsible for conserving trees so that we can have a programme that can teach the importance of trees and their conservation.

THE DEPUTY PRESIDENT OF SENATE:  Hon. Sen. Tongogara, you are debating a different motion.

HON. TONGOGARA:  Mr. President, I am on drought which is part of the motion.

THE DEPUTY PRESIDENT OF SENATE:  You can proceed.

HON. SEN. TONGOGARA:  Thank you Mr. President.  I was trying to explain that if we educate people on the causes of drought, everyone will be aware of the importance of trees.  The motion also talked about our livestock and how they are dying due to lack of grazing land.  What is destroying grazing land is the cutting down of trees.  In our culture, having livestock means you are rich. Livestock also was used for marriage purposes because people used to value livestock. There were greener pastures for cattle. Nowadays, my thinking is that if we need the livestock to thrive, we need to do something about it. There are also diseases which affect our cattle. I think a motion was raised on preventing cattle from pests like ticks and the Government responded in a positive way by giving people in rural areas pesticides to help during the January disease period. Therefore, I would like to say we can have cattle dying but we do not sit down to see how we can deal with the problem.

          We need to conserve our forests to avoid siltation in our dams and rivers due to deforestation. I would like to thank Hon. Dube for the motion which she raised. A lot of people in the urban areas do not have bank accounts but bank their money in the form of cattle which they can put in their butcheries. We need to take a close look at the areas where cattle are bred so that we conserve the forests and that cattle do not die from hunger. That is how we can move forward Mr. President.

          His Excellency tries his level best. We know that there were people who were given cattle so that we could start breeding the national herd to enable us to go to the level we were in the past. If we want the national herd to grow, people must be educated on how to maintain the cattle. We no longer have enough grazing lands. We would like to urge our farmers to plant grass and crops to feed the cattle. Cattle are dying as alluded to in the motion raised by Senator Dube. So, if we do this, it will help us to grow our cattle herd so that we do not import beef as a country due to shortage of cattle.

          HON. SEN. A. DUBE: I move that the debate do now adjourn.

          HON. SEN. TONGOGARA: I second.

          Motion put and agreed to.

          Debate to resume: Thursday, 19th May, 2022.

MOTION

POLICIES THAT ADDRESS AND PLUG LOOPHOLES RELATED TO TAX EVASION

          Eighth Order read: Adjourned debate on motion on policies that address and plug loopholes on tax evasions, illicit financial flows and corruption.

          Question again proposed.

          HON. SEN. CHINAKE: I move that the debate do now adjourn.

          HON. SEN. DENGA: I second.

          Motion put and agreed to.

          Debate to resume: Thursday, 19th May, 2022.

MOTION

REPORT OF THE 50TH PLENARY ASSEMBLY OF THE SADC PARLIAMENTARY FORUM HOSTED VIRTUALLY BY THE KINGDOM OF LESOTHO

          Ninth Order read: Adjourned debate on motion on the Report of the 50th Plenary Assembly of the SADC PF hosted virtually by the Kingdom of Lesotho.

          Question again proposed.

          HON. SEN. MUZENDA: I move that the debate do now adjourn.

          HON. SEN. TONGOGARA: I second.

          Motion put and agreed to.

          Debate to resume: Thursday, 19th May, 2022.

MOTION

MEASURES TO RESUSCITATE THE ECONOMY

          Tenth Order read: Adjourned debate on motion on the need to come up with measures to resuscitate the economy.

          Question again proposed.

          HON. SEN. MUZENDA: I move that the debate do now adjourn.

          HON. SEN. CHIRONGOMA: I second.

          Motion put and agreed to.

          Debate to resume: Thursday, 19th May, 2022.

On the motion of HON. SEN. MUZENDA seconded by HON. SEN. CHIRONGOMA, the Senate adjourned at Seven Minutes to Four o’clock p.m.

 

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