Women Empowerment and the Zimbabwean Indigenous Policy

Women’s empowerment has multiple meanings and is associated with a diversity of strategies. For example, within mainstream development discourse of the 1990s, it was often used by organizations focused on enlarging the choices and productivity levels of individual women, for the most part, in isolation from a feminist agenda; and in the context of a withdrawal of state responsibility for broad-based economic and social support. However, in the 1970s, when the concept was first invoked by women’s organizations, it was explicitly used to frame and facilitate the struggle for social justice and women’s equality through a transformation of economic, social and political structures at national and international levels,” (Bisnath and Elson; 1). Thus, the initial theoretical framework through which the original concept of women’s empowerment was produced acknowledged inequalities between men and women, situated women’s subordination in the family, the community, the market and the state, and emphasized that women experienced oppression differently according to their race, class, colonial history and their country’s position in the international economic order. In addition, it maintained that women have to challenge oppressive structures and processes simultaneously, and at multiple levels, thereby creating the space for empowerment to occur at both the individual and collective levels (Sen and Grown, 1987; Antrobus, 1989; and Moser, 1989).

The indigenisation and democratization of the Zimbabwean economy should  not be merely a moral initiative designed to overthrow the legacy of a past discriminatory colonial economic system, it instead should serve as a pragmatic development strategy designed to unleash the nations full economic potential. However, neither the pasts wrongs nor future's promise can be addressed without prioritising women's economic empowerment. In order to appreciate whether the National Indigenisation and Economic Empwerment  Act empowers women it is necessary to firstly, understand that under colonial misrule black women suffered double-edged discrimination and dis-empowerment as women and as black people.

If the Act is interested in women’s empowerment (as is claimed in In Chapter 14:33,), then it follows that it’s strategies should be concerned with strategies for women’s empowerment. It is therefore important to first have a brief discussion of Sarah Longwe’s Women Empowerment Framework (WEF). The Longwe Framework is an evaluative tool which helps planners or developmentalists to evaluate the progress made in project meant to achieve gender equality and women empowerment. It helps planners to critically assess the extent to which projects achieve and support women empowerment (March et al 1999). Longwe believes that poverty amongst women is a result of oppression and exploitation hence to put an end to this poverty, there is utmost need to empower women. The Longwe model defines women empowerment as an exercise or process whereby women achieve or attain control of the means and modes of production, equally participating in the development process with their male counterparts and also being in direct control of their own lives. This definition of empowerment is key in the understanding of the basis of the Longwe framework. Longwe’s definition is also supported by scholars like P Mugwini (2007). In a broader context empowerment refers to the efforts or measures to include and bring the marginalized that are outside socio-economic and political structures as a way of dismantling the discriminatory social constructions (Mugwini 2007; p125).

The efforts will aim to eradicate legal structures that favour men over women, socio-economic disparities that place women at a lower status compared to men, unequal opportunities in accessing key needs and services and most importantly uneven accessibility to economic resources (UN Development Fund for Women :2008). Hence the Longwe framework emphasizes on five different levels that can demonstrate the degree to which women are equal to men (March et al 1999). The extent to which these are present in socio-economic life determines the level of women empowerment. The levels of equality are control, participation, consientization, access and welfare. The levels are placed in the order of importance and the more they increase equality between men and women the higher they increase and achieve women empowerment.

Empowerment  def: UNIFEM (the United Nations Development Fund for Women) considers that women’s economic empowerment is essential for any strategy of poverty alleviation and defines this as “having access to and control over the means to make a living on a sustainable and long term basis, and receiving the material benefits of this access and control. Such a definition goes beyond short-term goals of increasing women’s access to income and looks for longer term sustainable benefits, not only in terms of changes to laws and policies that constrain women’s participation in and benefits from development, but also in terms of power relationships at the household, community and market levels” (Carr; 2).

Economic empowerment is the capacity of women and men to participate in, contribute to and benefit from growth processes in ways which recognise the value of their contributions, respect their dignity and make it possible to negotiate a fairer distribution of the benefits of growth. Eyben, R and others (2008),

The Thesaurus defines indigenous as native or original

 The Act defines indigenisation as a deliberate involvement of indigenous Zimbabweans in the economic activities of the country, to which hitherto they had no access, so as to ensure the equitable ownership of the nation's resources.

According to the Act an indigenous Zimbabwean means any person who, before April 18 1980 was disadvantaged by unfair discrimination on the grounds of his or her race and any descendant of such a person. This includes any company, association, syndicate or partnership which indigenous Zimbabweans form the majority of the members or hold a controlling interest

The business case for expanding women’s economic opportunities is becoming increasingly evident and is smart economics but the ACT still maintains the Zimbabwean industry and commerce as predominantly the domain of men, who own most businesses in all sectors. The levels of women’s participation in industry and commerce and business entrepreneurship as envisaged by the ACT continue to be unacceptably low. According to the General Regulations of 2010, the threshold for acquisition of 51% pertains to foreign-owned businesses with a net asset value of or above US$500 000. By implication, a 51% share means that the indigenous Zimbabwean, or consortium of indigenous Zimbabweans, would need to have capital of at least $255 000 to control a company effectively. The majority of Zimbabwean women might not have the capacity to raise the required share capital. Considering the fact that women bear the brunt of poverty in this country Efforts to enhance and improve women’s participation as stipulated by Longwe are disappointing. Longwe defines participation as women’s equal participation in the decision making process, in policy making, planning and administration.

Furthermore it is clear is that the Regulations preclude women from acquiring a substantial number of shares in the indigenized companies.  According to J. Matunhu ,the education and business acumen requirement also precludes poor people in the rural areas who are mainly women from  acquiring of the shares. It is only the rich who qualify to have the controlling shares of a company. In view of the above, one can safely conclude that the indigenisation policy targets people with the expertise necessary to start their own business operations. No wonder why Matzyszak (2011) claims that the indigenisation policy in Zimbabwe has been drafted to enrich those who are already rich. Longwe’s most important tool in redressing gender equality and achieving women empowerment is enhancing their ability to be in control (March et al 1999). This refers to women and men’s equal control over resources, opportunities and decision making.  Equal control denotes a balance of control between men and women so that there is no exploitation or domination of one sex by the other.

Longwe also considers women’s welfare as a key tool towards gender equality and women empowerment. This involves the level of material welfare of women relative to their male counterparts with respect to food supply, income and medical care. This is an area that has faced serious and bigger challenges and the empowerment efforts have been negatively affected. The Community Share Ownership Scheme fails to be explicit on the benefits to be accrued by people at household level thus automatically excluding women who are naturally the caregivers and the sex with the family “at heart.” The act fails to provide for women’s welfare which through them would benefit the family, hence the community culminating into the nation at large.

Longwe’s most important tool in redressing gender equality and achieving women empowerment is enhancing their ability to be in control (March et al 1999). This refers to women and men’s equal control over resources, opportunities and decision making.  Equal control denotes a balance of control between men and women so that there is no exploitation or domination of one sex by the other. Zimbabwe's empowerment legislation contains several clauses which seem specifically designed to achieve elite enrichment. For instance, Section 15(1) requires the Minister (who is male) to maintain a database of people who are potential beneficiaries of controlling interests in non-indigenous businesses. There is no guarantee that the Minister will consider women. A quota system might have improved the chances of women being included in the data base.

According to the United Nations Action plan of 2005  participation involves women’s involvement in needs, assessment, project implementation and analysis (United Nations Action Plan 2005) and making decisions that positively affect the communities they live in. However The legislation leaves the Minister with a broad discretion as to who may be put forward as a participant in an indigenisation scheme. As mentioned before,The Minister is a male in a male dominated government which has a tendency of operating as a “clique” might have lost touch with the day to day challenges women. If the Minister is not sensitive to the needs of women and 'if he  is not satisfied' that the application is made 'in good faith’ they stand to suffer neglect just as they did during and after colonial rule. The provision concerning the maintenance of a database must be read with section 5 of the Regulations, which gives the Minister discretion to decide whether to approve or reject an indigenisation plan or to attach conditions to such a plan. This proves beyond any reasonable doubt that the Act fails to empower the indigenous woman.

Women’s empowerment is assumed to be attainable through different points of departure, including political mobilization, consciousness raising and education. In addition, changes where and when necessary, in laws, civil codes, systems of property rights, and the social and legal institutions that underwrite male control and privilege, are assumed to be essential for the achievement of women’s equality. So, the other challenge is the extent to which the CDT Fund will be able to balance the gender developmental needs of communities. Notably, development is a relative term and so women and men have different developmental needs. Community shares might breed conflict and animosity among sexes. Thus resulting in a struggle within a struggle, it is most likely that the women will lose.

The impending indigenisation guidelines do not incentivise businesses to hire and promote black women to managerial and executive-level positions in specific ways. There should have been a reward system through companies that can demonstrate a percentage of black women in their workforces, and beyond that, a percentage holding manager-level or higher positions, should earn empowerment credits.  Businesses that employ equitable percentages of women in senior roles and across the firm, as well as pay them equally with their male counterparts should also qualify for empowerment credits. This would have opened the floodgates for womwn’s hands on training, education so as to qualify for the top post ascending therefore to Sara Longwe’s Concientisation. Zimbabwe’s efforts to address Longwe’s Concientisation have so far been extremely disappointing, according to Longwe Concientisation refers to women’s awareness of the difference between sex and gender. This entails that division of labour by sex should be fair and uniform and should exclude social perception and be influenced by one sex’s political and economic domination. The efforts made have yielded what Longwe’s framework describes as the negative level. There has been a feminization of labour especially those women who are considered less educated or illiterate (Esplen and Brody 2007, p4).

The Act does not encourage firms to meet indigenisation targets by creating Employee Share Ownership Plans (ESOP) for groups of female employees. An ESOP is a means through which employees can own a share of the company they work for and employee ownership increases production and profitability, and improves employees' dedication and sense of ownership. Here lacks what Longwe terms mobilization. Mobilisation means women’s collective action to analyse and identify the discriminatory practices that stand in their way, and collective and strategic action to remove these discriminatory practices (Longwe; 2002)

For those not directly employed by any corporation worth at least $500,000, the National Indigenous and Economic Empowerment Fund should does not create and support gender sensitive financial schemes to assist women to start and develop businesses. Special rewards such as tax incentives should also be given to financial institutions that have special programmes to support disadvantaged groups, especially women in business. This would have allowed women to have control over their own Small to Medium Enterprises, thus going hand in hand with Longwe’s Framework. The Government of Zimbabwe through the Act and other stakeholders should have been working flat-out to redress inequality in terms of control of factors of production and distribution of benefits. The Regulations should create a uniform platform for both men and women to be in control of factors of production and distribution of benefits starting ate household level to the national

Successful empowerment strategies also require the direct involvement of women in the planning and implementation of projects. The process of empowerment evolves like a spiral, involving changes in consciousness, the identification of target areas for change, and analyses of actions and outcomes, “which leads in turn to higher levels of consciousness and more finely honed and better executed strategies” (Batliwala, 1994). As a result, empowerment cannot be a “top down or one way process”, nor can there be a fixed formula for its achievement.

According to (Batliwala, 1994), the economic development approach situates “women’s economic vulnerability at the centre of their powerlessness”, and assumes that economic empowerment positively impacts various aspects of women’s existence. Its strategies are built around strengthening women’s position as workers through organising and providing them with access to support services. Though this approach improves women’s economic position, she notes that it is unclear that this change necessarily empowers them in other dimensions of their lives. The new indigenisation policy might force capital to fly out of the country leaving the businesses to collapse and women to descend deeper into poverty. This has been witnessed when in 2000 the government took over land from whites and parcelled it to indigenous Zimbabweans. Production on farms plummeted and the country changed its position from being the 'bread basket' of Southern Africa to a net importer of food grain. Thus womens lack of access to to financial support services as advocated for by Longwe might result in them sinking deeper into the abyss.

 Batliwala(2004) also argues that the consciousness-raising and organising empowerment approach is based on a complex understanding of gender relations and women’s status. This method ascribes women’s powerlessness to the ideology and practice of patriarchy and socio-economic inequality. Unlike the Indigenisation Regulations, strategies should focus on organizing women to recognise and challenge gender- and class-based discrimination in all aspects of their lives. However, though successful in enabling women to address their strategic needs, this approach may not be as effective in assisting them to meet their immediate or practical needs. The process of empowerment involves, first, women recognising the ideology that legitimises male domination and understanding how it perpetuates their oppression.  

The Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act should not merely be a moral initiative designed to redress the wrongs of the past, but must instead serve as a pragmatic growth strategy designed to realise the nations full economic potential. However, neither the pasts wrongs nor future's promise can be addressed without prioritising women's economic empowerment. In respect to the Longwe framework one can observe that Zimbabwe’s efforts to initiate gender equality and women empowerment are from satisfactory. The majority of the efforts made so far fall in the negative and neutral level of Longwe’s Women Empowerment Framework. Despite the policies and efforts made, Zimbabwe lacks the necessary resources, negative attitude towards women empowerment and a very strong patriarchal background. Other limitations also emanate from lack of co-ordination between and amongst stakeholders. The emancipation and empowerment of women is not an easy task and for it to be achieved the Government of Zimbabwe should strengthen its efforts

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