WHAT IGNORANT PUNDITS ON KAZUNGULA DEBATE NEVER WANT TO KNOW:
1) A tripartite agreement was reached that Zimbabwe will become part of the project once it pays its own contribution. Discussions smoothly underway. Until that payment is done, Kazungula remains jointly owned by

Botswana and Zambia. It is that straightforward.
2) Kazungula Bridge is one part of several routes servicing the North-South Corridor. It isn’t the only route!!! Besides, part of the Kazungula traffic passes through Zimbabwe, a country naturally placed as a sub-regional hub!!!

3) Any other route through Kazungula which avoids Zimbabwe has to contend with an extra 200plus kilometres. No sensible logistician ignores that spatial fact in logistical calculus. Add to that services for cargo in transit, through-Zimbabwe routes become a logical preference.

4) The route through Botswana complements services on North-South Corridor. It doesn’t compete with routes through Zimbabwe. The North-South Corridor is the fastest growing corridor on the continent. The sky will be large enough for all birds to fly.
5) Revenues from transit

…services are never the mainstay of any economy. More important investments do go towards defining a country as a winning proposition. There is more to be got if Zimbabwe ensures efficient operation of routes linking it to Mozambique and South Africa, themselves natural outlets

…for her exports. Indeed, a lot more to be got by structurally changing the Zimbabwe Economy into a manufacturing proposition which then exports northwards. As matters stand, Zimbabwe’s sub-regionally regulated routes bear the burden of South Africa’s north-bound exports!!

6)Zimbabwe’s current thrust of improving its own in-country and through-country arterial routes is a winning one. This means attending to both road and rail network, while developing and extending its pipeline network to make it extra-territorial. Such a multi-modal transport

..strategy is likely to turn Zimbabwe into a real sub-regional hub, while value-addition makes it an exporter. To remind each other that Transport is DERIVED DEMAND; the demand for transport is linked to ECONOMIC ACTIVITY. Not the other way!!!
7) I would put my top dollar on

…joint PORT FACILITY investments along the vast Mozambican coast, and ensuring the route to Maputo through Chicualacuala is done and efficiently managed. I would also think seriously about Kanyemba route up to DRC. That is a route for the future!!!!
8) Hey, I would invest

…heavily in Matabeleland North, principally in Victoria Falls and Hwange, bearing in mind route generators are ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES to which facilities like bridges, roads & rail arise to service. Overall, transport economics is a hard science; it is not about refulgent symbols!

We need to bring economic sense and reasoning into this whole debate which has, until now, had the pleasure of being led by ignorant, serial cynics who think Kazungula substitutes their sagging political fortunes. Come 2023, they will know the small Karanda Bridge means more to

…the Zimbabwean voter than the far-away, yet photogenic Kazungula Bridge, to which we will be a part anyway by then. Good day and sober thinking, my dear Zimbabweans!!!!!