Zim­babwe is propos­ing a strange plan to tax cit­i­zens liv­ing abroad in order to main­tain their vot­ing rights. The government’s goal is to try to bring eco­nomic recov­ery to the nation, but expa­tri­ates say that cit­i­zen­ship should not have a tax put on it.

From IRIN, we read more about pro­posal and it’s opposition.

Zim­bab­weans liv­ing abroad may have to pay tax in exchange for vot­ing rights and retain­ing their cit­i­zen­ship rights if the gov­ern­ment embraces a pro­posal made by finance min­is­ter Tendai Biti in Lon­don on 13 Decem­ber 2009.

Some émigrés fiercely oppose the idea. “It’s com­pletely barmy. You can­not put a price on cit­i­zen­ship and vot­ing rights — nor­mal coun­tries have these guar­an­teed by their con­sti­tu­tions,” protested Mduduzi Math­uthu, edi­tor of the London-based NewZimbabwe.com website.

The 156-page eco­nomic blue­print, Mov­ing For­ward in Zim­babwe — Reduc­ing Poverty and Pro­mot­ing Growth, rec­om­mended var­i­ous strate­gies to has­ten social and eco­nomic recov­ery in the trou­bled south­ern African nation, includ­ing tax­ing its far-flung citizens.

The report was pro­duced by 13 dis­tin­guished Zim­bab­wean aca­d­e­mics and pub­lished by the Brooks World Poverty Insti­tute at the Uni­ver­sity of Man­ches­ter, and launched by Biti at the invi­ta­tion of its authors. He also urged expa­tri­ates to sup­port the eco­nomic recov­ery process by invest­ing in the economy.

Biti promised that their invest­ments would be safe under the unity gov­ern­ment, formed in Feb­ru­ary 2009 by Pres­i­dent Robert Mugabe, leader of the long-ruling Zim­babwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), Prime Min­is­ter Mor­gan Tsvan­gi­rai, leader of the main wing of the Move­ment for Demo­c­ra­tic Change (MDC), and Arthur Mutam­bara, head of a break­away fac­tion of the MDC. It has been an uneasy marriage.

Biti agreed that tap­ping into the sav­ings of expa­tri­ates through tax­a­tion, in exchange of vot­ing and cit­i­zen­ship rights, was one way gov­ern­ment could source much-needed funds for eco­nomic recovery.

But the idea has not gone down well with all migrants. “Politi­cians must first focus on fix­ing the pol­i­tics, which is bro­ken, and invest­ment will come in response to that … This is a sure way to lose an elec­tion — who­ever takes this up and makes it their polit­i­cal man­i­festo,” Math­uthu told IRIN.

Remit­tances

Remit­tances from expa­tri­ate Zim­bab­weans is cred­ited with soft­en­ing the impact of the country’s eco­nomic col­lapse, which caused wide­spread food shortages.

Accord­ing to esti­mates by the Inter­na­tional Fund for Agri­cul­tural Devel­op­ment, a UN agency ded­i­cated to erad­i­cat­ing rural poverty, US$361 mil­lion was remit­ted in 2008 — exclud­ing hand-to-hand trans­fers — a num­ber that was expected to dou­ble in 2009.

Other esti­mates have put all remit­tances from expa­tri­ates in Britain to Zim­babwe at about US$1 bil­lion annually.

The report, which has not yet been offi­cially dis­cussed, urged gov­ern­ment to accord dual cit­i­zen­ship and vot­ing rights to the esti­mated three mil­lion Zim­bab­weans scat­tered across the world — at a price.

“Confidence-boosting mea­sures would include allow­ing dual nation­al­ity, restor­ing vot­ing rights for migrants who hold Zim­bab­wean cit­i­zen­ship, and cre­at­ing mech­a­nisms for them to be heard. In exchange, migrants should be pre­pared to pay an annual tax for retain­ing Zim­bab­wean nation­al­ity,” the report recommended.

Zimbabwe’s strin­gent immi­gra­tion laws pro­scribe dual cit­i­zen­ship, and those liv­ing out­side the coun­try are not allowed to cast absen­tee bal­lots unless they are civil ser­vants on gov­ern­ment busi­ness, but activists have been press­ing for reforms since the estab­lish­ment of the unity gov­ern­ment — a fight that has sup­port in both MDC formations.

No price on vot­ing rights

“Vot­ing rights are inalien­able — we don’t have to pay gov­ern­ment to be allowed to vote. It’s just out­ra­geous … It will cer­tainly be a big mis­take if gov­ern­ment buys into this idea,” Dumaphi Mema, pres­i­dent of the US-based Asso­ci­a­tion of Zim­bab­weans based Abroad (AZBA), told IRIN.

Mema said many Zim­bab­weans in the US were will­ing to invest in the eco­nomic rebuild­ing of their once-prosperous coun­try, but wor­ried about the fragility of the unity gov­ern­ment. They also wanted postal votes to be allowed in elec­tions, and to main­tain Zim­bab­wean cit­i­zen­ships even after acquir­ing per­ma­nent res­i­dence in their host coun­tries, with no strings attached.

“Many peo­ple don’t have faith in this unity gov­ern­ment; recent state­ments by Pres­i­dent Mugabe have not been encour­ag­ing. Peo­ple need to see pal­pa­ble polit­i­cal and eco­nomic reforms before they can com­mit their resources,” Mema commented.

Bril­liant Mhlanga, a polit­i­cal ana­lyst, said it was impor­tant that Zim­bab­weans liv­ing in the dias­pora played a major role in national rebuild­ing, despite the cur­rent polit­i­cal uncertainty.

“We have a respon­si­bil­ity to play in Zim­babwe. If we are really wor­ried about cre­at­ing a good future for our pos­ter­ity, it is imper­a­tive that we sup­port government’s revival efforts, despite the pol­i­tics of the day,” Mhlanga told IRIN from Lon­don. “If it means pay­ing tax, so be it.”

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