Introduction
Following the 22 November 2018 presentation of the 2019 national budget by the Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Professor Mthuli Ncube, Citizens’ Cabinet Portfolio lead for Art, Culture, Heritage and Tourism, Butholezwe Nyathi, took time to conduct a cultural analysis of the budget. The parameters of the analysis were the extent to which the budget statement, as an implicit cultural policy, advances the interests of arts, culture and heritage (ACH). The analysis is premised on the presented budget speech by the Minister of Finance.
Freedom of Thought and Expression
The commitment to advance the ideals of good governance and promotion of democratic principles is most welcome. For creatives, the freedom of thought – free from externally induced self-censorship – is the genesis of the creative value chain. Creatives thrive when they are able to create, produce and disseminate work to the consuming public without undue censorship. Commitments to amend provisions of the Public Order and Security Act (POSA) and Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) are vital in promoting freedoms of association and assembly, freedoms inalienable to vibrant creation, production, distribution and access to cultural goods, products and services. Respect and protection of artistic freedom as a subset of human rights is central to the ideals of the UNESCO 2005 Convention on Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, to which Zimbabwe is a signatory.
No dedicated fund for cultural production
For many years, creative practitioners in Zimbabwe have clamoured for direct government funding to support creation, production and distribution of cultural goods, activities and services. The budget statement is quite emphatic that Government seeks to cut down on expenditure and instead create an enabling environment for a private sector led economy through high impact projects and programmes. While lobbying for direct funding of arts establishments is an ongoing endeavour, it is a pity that while other sectors of the economy such as manufacturing and environment have dedicated funds to support their viability, the arts sector is not privileged in this regard. Owing to lack of capital, optimum cultural production will remain constrained across the creative value chain in 2019.
Culture for Nation Branding
The 2019 budget commits to supporting Zimbabwe’s brand development at the global stage. To the extent that no direct funding for localised cultural production has been provided for, it is the Citizens’ Cabinet highly considered submission that a strong and sustainable brand development programme must include Creative and Cultural Industries (CCIs) as these are the institutions that generate soft power through cultural products; soft power which gets projected to the rest of the world through electronic and digital media. Extra-territorial cultural expression is inherently an expression of a nation’s soft power.
Decentralised Cultural Governance and Localised Regeneration
The Citizens’ Cabinet notes the commitment towards facilitating the concerted participation of local authorities in achieving ease of doing business and championing the economic transformation agenda. In terms of CCIs, cities are enclaves of creativity and innovation and Zimbabwe’s cities are no exception. In line with the budget pronouncement that decentralisation is a key strategy for fair and just governance, the Citizens’ Cabinet is desirous of an expansion of this budget principle to cultural governance. More commendable is the enunciation in the 2019 budget that for purposes of inclusive growth, districts and growth will be incorporated in the development agenda. The Citizens’ Cabinet believes in the equitable development of rural and urban communities.
Economic Valuation of Culture
The 2019 budget statement refers to the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) as having a provision for the Zimbabwe Statistical Agency (ZIMSTAT) to produce socio-economic statistics that will underpin assessment of various provinces and local authorities contribution to the overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP), including spatial GDP figures. The Citizens’ Cabinet advances the argument that provincial GDP valuations should include mapping of the economic value of the CCIs in terms of number of jobs created, contribution of cultural activities to the GDP and how cultural goods and services are valued through commercial transactions. Such localised cultural valuation will generate vital data to inform cultural policy and strategy making.
Access to Youth Funds by Creatives
The newly constituted Ministry of Youth, Sports, Arts and Recreation (MoYSAR) presents a window of opportunity to creative operators. The budget states that youth empowerment interventions are aimed at unlocking entrepreneurial value of youths as a strategy for employment creation and income generation. While there are/have been youth funds such as Ukondla/Kurera which have hardly benefited creatives, the Citizens’ Cabinet avers that young cultural operators should be granted equal opportunities to benefit from such grants. Furthermore, while some creative ventures are inherently entrepreneurial and can generate profits to repay loans, some artistic products, services and activities serve an aesthetic function that cannot be quantified in monetary terms but all the same serve an important social function. The housing of youth and arts in one Ministry presents post-budgetary congruence that if optimally harnessed can redress some capital constraints faced by young cultural operators.
Job Creation
The 2019 budget is anchored on the principles of strong, sustainable and shared growth. The budget is also framed as a building block towards Zimbabwe attaining the Upper Middle Income Society status by 2030. Realisation of this vision partly entails creation of jobs for the youths who are acknowledged in the budget as constituting a majority dividend and thus in good stead to benefit the most should this vision be attained. The Citizens’ Cabinet notes that a significant proportion of operators in the CCI are youths and this means young creatives are inherently positioned to benefit. However, these aspirations in the case of the arts will remain fallacious as there is no dedicated financial injection to stimulate production and ultimately job creation through sustainable commercial transactions. Cultural operators now need to strengthen relations with the private sector and unlock alternative sources of funding.
Institutional Strengthening
The desire to strengthen institutional capacity in terms of planning, implementation and monitoring and evaluation should be extended to cultural institutions. One glaring gap has been the inability of the CCI to empirically and consistently valuate their contribution to jobs creation and the GDP. It is prudent to set up a cultural statistics unit in the MoYSAR to collaborate with ZimStat.
Macro-economic Context
The arts, culture and heritage sector does not exist in a vacuum but in a broader economic context. Without resolution of the fiscal and current deficits, artists will continue to be hamstrung to produce content and consumers will also have no capacity to access cultural products and services. There is a direct causative relationship between macro-economic stability and the diversity of cultural expression and vibrancy.
Conclusion
Based on the aforementioned, the Citizens’ Cabinet will continue lobbying government for a dedicated arts fund. The need to pursue alternative private funding is equally important. The positive attributes of the 2019 budget will only be realised if the dictates of the budget are adhered to across the gambit of the governance infrastructure.