Moving forward in Zimbabwe - Brooks World Poverty Institute - The ...

Moving forward in Zimbabwe
Reducing poverty and promoting growth
Senior public officials were expected to lead, own and manage
the reform process by demonstrating strong leadership skills that
focused on outlining the organisational vision and mission. This
was complemented by ministry strategic plans focused on results,
with specific targets, time-frames and budgets.
Permanent secretaries were expected to conduct regular
performance reviews of their staff, in order to ensure that the
intended objectives were met. They were also expected to promote
and enable learning and knowledge management within their
portfolio for this purpose, and to lead and manage high-performing
teams. However, no incentives were included to reward high
performers or sanction poor performers. Furthermore, the role of
the accounting officers in leading the process was not clear. During
this period a code of conduct was also introduced and cascaded
in all ministries. A computerised human resources information
management system was introduced, initially at the Public Service
Commission and subsequently (subject to resources) to be cascaded
to line ministries, in order to facilitate appropriate staffing levels,
career planning, promotion, staff appraisal and disciplinary action,
incentives and time management.
The permanent secretaries are central to the effective
implementation of the reforms. As accounting officers, they
should provide leadership for the process. It is not clear to what
extent this role is recognised in the programme and whether they
themselves perceive and accept this role. Performance appraisal
of staff from ministries appears to be subjective, as they do not
correlate with the poor quality of services delivered to the public
by the same officers. Leadership is critical to secure commitment
to change. Executive management training is therefore important,
to strengthen managers’ capabilities to lead reforms and command
innovative teams. Lastly, a clear communication strategy needs to
be put in place to inform all staff on progress, as reports revealed
that most operational level staff did not know or understand the
mission or vision of their ministries. They frequently complained
also of slow decision making, despite the fact that top level
reporting levels were compressed from six to three. This may be
indicative of senior officials’ reluctance to make decisions and to
take risks on outcomes the results of which are not predictable in
an unstable environment.
Recruitment and promotion to the public service was
professionalised in the second phase of public service reforms.
The process now uses open competition, rather than recruitment
within and seniority in the service. Assessment and examination
as well as interviews are used to recruit and promote competent
people to the public service. Assessment centres are used to assess
and examine potential candidates for recruitment into various
positions in government, with a view to matching skills to jobs,
and accompanying performance appraisals and reward systems
are put in place. In order to have high-performing civil servants,
specific capacity-building programmes became essential. Thus, the
executive management development programme was instituted
at the Zimbabwe Institute of Administration and Management
(ZIPAM), targeted at middle managers and above, in order to
enhance management skills. However, the commercialisation of
ZIPAM delinked it from the provision of adequate back-stopping
services essential to the reform process, such as training, research
and consultants’ services. It needed to refocus its mandate to
support the ongoing reforms. Specialist courses for economists,
accountants and pension management were negotiated and
conducted at other tertiary institutions on behalf of the Public
Service Commission. The public service continued to identify
specific training requirements for in-service training through
bilateral and multilateral agreements. A computerised performance
financial management information system was introduced, with the
aim of supporting expenditure control and financial accountability
in resource utilisation by all ministries.
Coordination of reforms
To coordinate the reform process, change management units were
established in each ministry and coordinated at the Public Service
Commission by a national coordinator linked to the Office of the
President and Cabinet Reform Unit. This Office is well positioned
to assume the role of policy oversight and coordination. However,
there have been no meaningful, systematic assessment measures to
evaluate the efficacy of the Office in discharging this responsibility.
It is paramount that policy cohesion and linkages are established
and synchronised, to avoid the fragmentation associated with earlier
reforms and in order to accomplish the intended socio-economic
outcomes. Adequate timelines to implement the programme are
needed, since reforms are not one-day events. They take a longterm
perspective on changing people’s attitudes, reducing resistance
to change and adopting new methods and technology, and need
sufficient resources to compete with other societal demands.
Political uncertainty has also contributed to an unstable
policy environment, hampering the overall programme goal of
creating an enabling environment for reforms. The magnitude of
corruption, though not quantified, is also leading to poor quality
service delivery, lethargy and poor work ethics. It would be useful
if the Anti Corruption Commission could disaggregate the cases
so far dispensed, to indicate the prevalence, scale and type of
illegal activities in the public sector. The data would quantify the
resources lost to government for improving service delivery. One
of the problems is also that the legal framework on corruption is
weak, as it places the burden of proof on the prosecution instead
of requiring the accused to prove how wealth was acquired.
Civic participation and gender mainstreaming
Civic organisations are involved in policy and programme design,
in order to enhance public responsiveness and accountability.
This is conducted through the NECF and its various task forces
mandated to examine key issues, in order to provide evidencebased
information in policy formulation and the decision-making
process. The client charter is also used to promote accountability
and improve the standards of services, and suggestion boxes are
used to capture public concerns for redress.
Gender mainstreaming mechanisms were put in place in all
ministries and treated as a key result area. Affirmative action was
adopted as a strategy for training women and promoting them to
senior management positions, with the aim that by 2005 30 per
cent, and by 2015 50 per cent, of decision-making positions would
be held by women. By 2006, of the 32 permanent secretaries only
six were women. Of the 13 state university vice chancellors, only
one is a woman. This demonstrates that the strategies in place have
not been sufficient to overcome the institutional and social barriers
to women’s emancipation or to meet the 2005 goal, which has
already been missed.
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