In an April 2014 moment when silence would have been golden, Chikomba Central MP Felix Tapiwa Mhona, elected to go for the lower prize of silver. At this time, Botswana and Zambia were planning to build the Kazungula Border Bridge – not Kasane Bridge. Via a parliamentary question, Mhona wanted the Minister of Transport and Infrastructure, Obed Mpofu to explain the government’s position on a project that he deemed detrimental to the country’s economic fortunes.
“There is a bridge that is being constructed between Botswana and Zambia known as Kasane Bridge,” the MP prefaced his question. “What is the government policy in place so as to counter this conspiracy whereby you are going to see traffic bypassing our Beitbridge, which is the gateway to southern Africa, consequently impacting negatively on our revenue?”
Against that and many more odds and some seven years later, the project went ahead and nine days ago, the Kazungula Border Bridge was officially opened. We haven’t been able to verify this but as the new Minister of Transport and Infrastructure, Mhona would certainly have accompanied President Emmerson Mnangagwa to commission a project he once described as a “conspiracy.”
There is no public record of Mnangagwa, who cut the ribbon to mark the Bridge officially opened, ever using language that combative to describe the construction project. However, the Zimbabwean government – which he was Vice President in – was vociferously and publicly opposed to the building of the bridge. It is unclear what was going through Mnangagwa’s mind when he earlier tweeted a statement that read: “During this month, I will be joining the Presidents of Botswana and Zambia at Kazungula, to commission the Kazungula Bridge. With the coming in of the New Dispensation, Zimbabwe came on board the project and the bridge is now owned by three countries.” Whatever it was, Botswana and Zimbabwe felt compelled release a statement that cleared the confusion that the Zimbabwean president was trying to cause. By “New Dispensation” he would be referring to the post-Mugabe government when little has changed in terms of how Zimbabwe is governed and when he himself a hold-over from the Old Dispensation.
The answer to Mhona’s question was fraudulent because it never stated government policy in place to counter a conspiracy to build a bridge that is already greatly improving continental traffic flow and will reduce transit time from 36 hours to 2 hours. First describing Mhona’s question as “very important”, Mpofu stated that since there was no border between Botswana and Zambia, construction of the bridge was impossible.
“Our understanding is supported by the United Nations on boundaries; that there is no boundary between Botswana and Zambia. If they want to build a bridge on that piece of land, Zimbabwe has to be involved,” the minister said.
It would seem that the question and answer were a pre-arranged charade to publicly send a message to both Botswana and Zambia – which message the two countries received loud and clear. Ironically, Zimbabwe had been invited to participate in the project but fell out largely due to its inability to mobilise funds. There was the public spat over the 2008 general election that ZANU-PF is alleged to have rigged. Then presidents Ian Khama of Botswana and Levy Mwanawasa made public statements that President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe was not too happy about. However, the latter was a minor issue compared to the former.
It was under such circumstances that construction started after Botswana and Zambia secured additional funding from Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA), the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the European Union to top up what they had themselves contributed. Rebutting what Mnangagwa said (as Botswana and Zambia did) was probably the right thing to do but it would have been more fun to leave him to the media. Journalists would certainly have had an opportunity to paint the Zimbabwean president into a corner by asking him to state how much his country contributed and when.
Mhona’s point about the need to preserve a state of affairs in which Beitbridge remained the gateway to the rest of the continent was actually a ruse to hide the fact that Zimbabwe had dropped out of the project because it couldn’t meet its financial obligations towards the project. The bigger fraud in Mpofu’s answer though was that it didn’t reveal what Zimbabwe’s policy to counter Botswana and Zambia was: sabotage. Zimbabwe had hoped that the project would collapse if it withdrew from it – and that almost happened. Fortunately, the partners came up with a Plan B – which Botswana’s former Minister of Transport and Communications, Nonofo Molefi, detailed to Sunday Standard. Upon hearing Mhona-like talk from Zimbabwean politicians, Botswana and Zambia decided to make changes the design plan.
“We approached Namibia and asked that the bridge pass through their territory and they agreed,” Molefi said.
The result was that instead of going straight into Zimbabwe from Botswana as had been the original plan, the bridge now curves westwards into Namibian territory, then makes a landfall in Zambia.
Molefi also revealed that after the three countries had agreed to construct the bridge, each had to go out to mobilise funds from development partners. Botswana and Zambia countries approached Japan and the result was that the project was funded by the Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA), the African Development Bank (AfDB), the European Union as well as the governments of both southern African countries. JICA contributed 57.5 per cent, AfDB 31.5 per cent, Botswana and Zambia an equal 9.2 per cent while the remaining 1.8 per cent came from the EU under its Infrastructure Trust Fund grant.
The funds mobilisation occurred at a time that Zimbabwe’s economy was hopelessly slumped against the ropes. Around this time, Moody’s Investors Service, the United States credit ratings agency, released a report in which it assessed AfDB’s performance and just happened some to mention some of the latter’s clients.
“The AfDB’s percentage of nonperforming loans (NPLs) – 2.9 percent at the end of 2013 – is still relatively high for a Aaa-rated MDB, mainly related to very long-dated arrears from countries no longer eligible to borrow from the AfDB, namely Somalia, Sudan and Zimbabwe,” said the Moody’s report, referring by “MDB” to multilateral development bank.
Mhona’s fears will be fully realised as the bridge starts operating. Kazungula Bridge will certainly run rings round Beitbridge border post – which presently generates tollgates revenue that Zimbabwe desperately needs. The Bridge is seen as a vital economic link between Botswana and Zambia and the rest of Africa and is expected to integrate the economies served by the North South Corridor as well as develop the mining sectors of Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
