ADOPT COUNTER-CYCLICAL APPROACH

Sir,

One would argue that there is always a thin line between economics and politics particularly on matters of fiscal policy.

It is frustrating to note that the general commentary on the country’s economic situation is made predominantly by people who claim to understand economics but on closer inspection, they are nothing else but wanna-be economists. 

The subject of economics is very wide and often complex, hence a development economist cannot be taken at face value to be a monetary economist or a labour economist etc. This is one reason why it’s often said that whenever there is one or two economists, there will be three or four opinions.

Criticise

It is well and good that people can criticise government for being weak in addressing the leakage in our cash flow cycle but the bigger picture is that Eswatini’s indebtedness to external multilateral bodies is still far lower than the world average. The idea of pursuing ‘regime change’ through populist views to woo the masses as against selling yourself on a solid political framework is therefore cheap politics. 

Logic

The obvious economic logic is to ensure that we adopt a counter-cyclical approach to the problem which means coming up with a stimulus plan to kick-start the economy. In good times, the approach would be to save so that we are covered for any future calamity, while in bad times you look for stimulus levers. Cutting costs, salaries and spending in general has a domino-effect of curtailing demand and throwing the economy into a recessionary roller coaster. 

Helping

Instead of these external multilateral bodies putting the cart before the horse, they should be helping Eswatini to get loans to embark on full scale mining, agriculture, manufacturing etc so that we move the pendulum from a consumer economy to one anchored around productivity of finished goods as against simple raw materials. With our famous ‘cheap labour’ tag, we can then look forward to sustainable growth, reduced unemployment which in turn would curb the social ills of rising crime levels and political turmoil that will in future pit ‘haves’ against ‘have-nots’. Democracy as an ideological option can then flourish around ethics and morality as against greed and corruption.

Yours truly

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