Zimpapers Logo

Nqobile Tshili, Chronicle Correspondent
GOVERNMENT has set up four technical teams to monitor and evaluate the implementation of projects with one of the committees tasked to ensure that resources are distributed equitably across provinces in line with President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s devolution thrust.

Finance and Economic Development Minister Mthuli Ncube said the setting up of the monitoring and evaluation teams comes at a time when Government wants to inculcate a culture of accountability in the implementation of its projects.

This is contained in the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) economic blueprint that Prof Ncube launched last Friday.

The Minister said under former President Mr Robert Mugabe’s era, the country had been consistently formulating economic blueprints without strict adherence to them.

“There was never a concerted vision of implementing more longer-term strategies that entailed pain and sacrifice, extending beyond short-term populist consumptive interventions,” he said.

“The Old Dispensation behaved as if the rest of the world owed us, content to dwell on past and historical injustices without developing and adopting strategies that pulled out the nation from under-development.”

Prof Ncube said perpetual focusing on the past saw a decline in macro-economics, decay in infrastructure with standards of living plummeting while the Government did nothing.

He said for the Second Republic to achieve President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s vision of making the country a middle income nation by 2030, it has to adhere to strict evaluation and monitoring of projects. “The implementation, monitoring and evaluation of this TSP will involve the participation of all key stakeholders. This will embrace Government, business, labour, civil society, academia, development partners, and communities,” he said.

Prof Ncube said Government has set up a high level results framework and associated indicators for tracking the performance of the TSP against clear baselines and targets that will be central for success.

“Accordingly, a Comprehensive Matrix of Policies, Projects and Programmes to be undertaken, as well as the attendant results to be achieved over the programme period will be developed,” said Prof Ncube.

“This will be for purposes of tracking progress and measuring results during the implementation of the Transitional Stabilisation Programme, and offer an opportunity for periodic reviews.”

He said the monitoring and evaluating team will include among others a steering committee led by the Office of the President and Cabinet which will play an oversight role in the implementation of the policies.

“Oversight will be undertaken through a Steering Committee comprising of co-chairs of the Focal Areas, and chaired by the Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet and will meet on a quarterly basis,” he said.

The Minister said the other committee will be the Devolution Monitoring Committee consisting of experts to ensure that funds can be applied equitably across provinces and would be inclusive of communities.

“The actual implementation will be done by line Ministries, including all the development players. Consequently, in order to ensure the enhanced partnerships and synergies in the implementation of the TSP, Ministries will be grouped into Focal Areas to be co-chaired by line Ministries and Private Sector or Civic Society. These Focal Areas shall be cascaded as well to the Provincial and District levels,” he said.

Prof Ncube said there will be a technical committee headed by his Ministry which will co-ordinate with line ministries including their co-chairs and focal persons in those departments.

“This will be chaired by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development and will meet on a monthly basis and will produce reports which will be submitted to the Steering Committee,” he said.

“The thrust of the Technical Committee will be to identify gaps in the implementation of policies, programmes and projects and make appropriate recommendations for policy reviews so as to improve the efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of the scheduled results.”

Prof Ncube said his Ministry will also ensure allocation of adequate budgetary resources for Monitoring and Evaluation of policies.

He said another team will be the Fiscal and Financial Stabilisation Committee to co-ordinate and monitor adherence to the fiscal and monetary targets outlined in the economic blueprint. — @nqotshili