The nut cracker: My dream budget speech

Tom Sangala May 24, 2016

29 3 minutes read

The beauty of dreams is that one can forget them when one wakes up. So I was not surprised when I, for a short while, dreamt I was President of my dream village and I had the opportunity to address the dream village parliament (to MPs who were also dreaming) on the occasion of opening the dream budget session.

“Good Afternoon my fellow villagers, as your number one servant whom you hired on that Election Day, I now humbly perform one of the duties which are assigned to me by the constitution. This is the time I report to you as my employers about the state of our economy. Since I took over this position of President it has been two months now, I am sure that all of you will agree with me that I have had enough time to understand the economic challenges that confront us as a village.

I want to warn you that you should not expect anything big in this Budget. The reason for that is very simple. We as a village cannot spend money we do not have. It will therefore be illogical for me to ask you to debate on expenditure we can’t afford. So my fellow villagers forget a dream budget. My budget for next month will be simple and anchored on clear mathematics and good intentions.

This budget has only one theme, since it has been proven before that when I include too many themes some of you fail to follow and you end up sleeping and snoring! The only theme of interest to me is the economy. My fellow villagers this choice has been inspired my other predecessor Che Kumtunda who famously reminded us that “Ndale Samadya”. You see in this village politics has become a game of mudslinging and posturing. Politics will never put food on your table but the economy will. I believe that you elected me because you know that I was the better candidate capable of making your lives better and too much politicking will not bring food on your table.

Unlike the previous Presidents, I will accept mistakes that we have made as a Party and as Cabinet. You see I know that by accepting mistakes, I will be handing ammunition to the Leader of Opposition in this village the reverend Prophet. However, I do this in the belief that you my fellow villagers are intelligent enough to know a false Prophet from a true one. Secondly, it is because I believe that the first step in solving a problem is to identify and accept what is wrong so that it can be fixed.

The first mistake is the figure that our village economy is going to grow by 5.1 percent this month. You see this cannot be possible because the same people who gave me the figure told me that this will be revised downwards due to bad weather conditions that will affect the harvest.

My fellow villagers, the fact that the economy will grow at a rate far below the 5.1 percent is just one of the issues I need to address. The other problems include high cost of living, government expenditure and general waste including thieving from our public purse. Our currency did not behave very well last month and then the neighbours who used to give us their money are now running away.

My fellow villagers, my solutions to these problems will be more practical and not just text book solutions that people read and recite every time they open their mouths. This village will not grow without the natives investing in various businesses. I know that the cost of borrowing in this village is astronomical. I have therefore ordered that should reduce domestic borrowing so as not overcrowd private sector and also help reduce interest rates. This will ensure that our small and medium enterprises move into value addition investments since they can borrow cheaply and create jobs.

In addition this village produces good products like tomatoes, beans, potatoes and onions and I therefore do not understand why we keep on importing these on the pretext of attracting foreign direct investment.

I have also been told that our debts are below internationally acceptable limit of debt to GDP ratio but that cannot be a justification for consumption oriented borrowing and thereby diverting resources from social sectors to debt servicing. I have therefore suspended domestic borrowing so that we do not crowd out private sector and increase interest rates.

My fellow villagers, our tax revenues the whole of last month were below the target, in addition, even these little resources are being stolen and if not stolen they are not being used wisely and responsibly. I will ensure and enforce that these few resources are invested in critical sectors like irrigation dependent agriculture, health, education, manufacturing and tourism where we can get immediate results and earn foreign exchange through exports. We cannot continue to spend more than we are collecting! This village, my friends, is living beyond its means…”

Then I woke up!