Brown must speak up

IF THERE is one politician who should be thanking her lucky stars that Zimbabwe is going through a political crisis it must be Minister of Public Enterprises Lynne Brown.

It has distracted many from the serious accusations made against her by Eskom reputation manager Khulani Qoma to the inquiry into state capture by Parliament’s public enterprises committee on Tuesday – the very day Zimbabwe captured the world’s imagination.

Qoma has laid out an argument for why he says Brown is at best an accessory to a number of criminal offences and how she is a Gupta lackey. Unfortunately for Brown, as interesting and engaging as Zimbabwe’s unfolding story might be, the allegations against her – made under oath – are not a matter of pretending that they did not happen or one to be dismissed as yet another unkind word by a political opponent.

They demand that Brown appear before the commission and state her side of the story. A media statement denying all and calling Qoma names cannot be sufficient. Brown needs to show the courage of her convictions by taking the oath and stating what she knows to be true.

Brown appearing before the parliamentary committee would mean more than her reputation being at stake. It would be about clutching onto what was left of the eroding culture of holding public representatives accountable.

Civil society must put pressure on Brown to attend the inquiry and rebut Qoma. Civil society must exercise this responsibility because the political party that deployed her and the president who appointed her have become indifferent to accusations pertaining to the abuse of state power and self-enrichment programmes by elected public representatives.

As civil society, we cannot afford to give in to what at times feels like an overwhelming feeling of despair over the dismissive attitude the ruling elites have for the general populace.

Tempting as it might be to throw our hands up in despair at yet another report of corruption, we cannot afford to do so.