We can fund luxurious lifestyles of the political elite and their cronies. We have the money; we just keep making bad choices about how to spend it. Since independence, lawmakers in both ZANU PF and the opposition have restricted access to decent living conditions for most citizens in villages.

For most village residents, life is an endurance test never to be enjoyed; it is just getting by, not thriving. The village space represents the normalisation of suffering characterised by widespread poverty, gender inequality, lack of access to basic amenities like clean water, and healthcare, inadequate education, poor infrastructure – electricity, housing, transport network, internet coverage – reliance on subsistence farming, high rates of disease and death, and limited economic opportunities.

It is not lost to all that the development crises and poverty in the village are the by-product of multi-layered decisions by today’s political elite. To change the political and socioeconomic trajectory, we need to analyse how power and institutions create poverty, and how this can be changed through political action.

The causes of poverty are multifaceted including the colonialism background whose biased social, political and extractive economic structures disproportionately concentrated power and infrastructural investment in urban centres that were mainly inhabited by white settlers at the expense of villages, home to black natives. Natives in villages were politically marginalised, forcibly pushed out and replaced by white farmers from fertile land for farming and agriculture.

At independence, Zimbabwe’s lawmakers – the black elite who it now appears aspired to everything white from dress code to the English language, etc., – retained and maintained, with cosmetic alterations, the same socioeconomic structures that had proven detrimental to village residents’ empowerment during the colonial period.

When the black political elite and their allies cut deals for independence from the coloniser, they froze out or pushed down the list of priorities the interests (land and agriculture) of the villager. The villager was marginalised from the decision-making process and left with no stake in the institutions and laws that governed and shaped his/ her future.

Public cynicism about present effects of colonialism on the village landscape is understandable seeing Zimbabwe has been independent over four decades. We cannot allow our leaders the luxury of being selective when it comes to their responsibilities. For instance, how much of the poverty experienced in the village today is directly traceable to colonialism and what proportion is because of decisions by current lawmakers?

No black lawmaker openly credits his or her luxurious lifestyle to adopted colonial structures, but they are all loud and clear when blaming colonialism for poverty in the village. This is gaslighting, diversionary tactics intended to redirect public anger to an imagined enemy and protect the morally bankrupt elite from scrutiny.

We want to make it clear our understanding that today’s village design and experience is the responsibility of the government of the day, not history.

Disdain of the village way of life is palpable and normalised within society. “Komnyam’ ubambile” – literally, a place consumed or gripped by darkness is a derogatory term casually used in Matabeleland to describe the perceived inferiority of the village population and living standards. Instead of minimisation, we must validate the poverty in the village infrastructure and analyse how that impacts everyone.

Government opinion and attitudes towards the village influence level of engagement with the people and their involvement in policy decisions. If you think villages are home to unsophisticated people who do not desire or deserve high quality services, your approach is not consultative but talking down to them.

It is no surprise that villages would lag in virtually all economic development indicators compared to towns and cities, lawmakers do not feel the pressure to invest in villages. Ignorance and poor policies leave villages exposed and vulnerable to underdevelopment.

Look at an average home in a Matabeleland village, you will be forgiven for mistaking many of the houses for ruins from early 19th Century. It is bewildering to the average citizen to see the political elites and their cronies moving from house to house, each one grander than the last, yet they cannot afford even the modest house over their heads.

For the average villager with limited resources, and those at risk in their current living situation, access to decent and affordable housing is pivotal to their safety and long-term stability.

Decent accommodation must be an expectation not an exception; it is a basic need, but lawmakers have chosen to restrict that right by diverting funds away and to interests of the elites. Narcissism and moral degradation influence lawmakers’ attitudes, priorities on expenditure, and conduct towards citizens.

Reviewing attitudes and priorities is quintessential to policy change. Instead of being consumed with maintaining self-importance, leaders must take responsibility to realign power and decision-making to community needs. Centralisation of power has failed; it is time for localisation of decisions.