“It is our people who through their productive activities will create wealth for Zimbabwe because the strength of any nation is directly a potential and the culture of its members as expressed in its constructive efforts towards a common goal. – (Mutumbuka:1978)

THUS as we have said many times before, the children in schools in the struggle made goods which were needed to sustain life in the camps.
They made benches, tables, desks, blackboards, grew their own food, sewed their own uniforms constructed their barracks, and cooked their own food.
It was the dearest and most ardent wish of the liberation movements to transform the Rhodesian education system to the model that linked theory and practice, mental and manual production hence the establishment of the Foundation for Education with Production in 1981, only one year after they assumed power.
While this system flourished for many years in the ZIMFEP pilot schools, education with production never became part of the mainstream, schools in the rest of the system remained largely immune to education with production.
It is a moot question, but not insuperable.
Political economy was destroyed because it spelt too clearly and too loudly the national goal:
“Tinoda Zimbabwe neupfumi hwayo hwose.”
Political economy was the ideological clarion for taking over Zimbabwe ‘neupfumi hwayo hwose,’ education with production was the engine and it was fought no less viciously.
For people to live, they need material goods, without that, they cannot sustain life. To empower people therefore is to position them in control of the production of their material means of life and conversely, to disempower them is take the control of their material means of life out of their hands.
This was amply demonstrated in the period 2007-2008.
Those who controlled the production of goods simply hoarded themand people could not accessthem.
When government tried to control the prices, goods simply disappeared from the shelves.
Because we did not control the production of our own means of livelihood, those who did, the capitalists, brought us to our knees.
The founding fathers of Zimbabwe understood the political economy of capitalism hence they sought to protect the nation from such tragedies by grounding education in production so it could serve the practical needs of the people.
Where during the struggle the children had made benches, tables from bamboo, in their new ZIMFEP schools independent Zimbabwe they used their wood technology to make benches, chairs, desks, stools and other furniture.
In their metalwork classes they made windowframes and doorframes for their new classrooms and dormitories.
And while during the liberation struggle they had constructed their own barracks using wooden poles, after independence they made their own bricks and constructed their schools.
They also kept cattle and milked them.
They grew their food and sold the surplus.
The ZIMFEP schools practiced a system that led to self-sufficiency and also produced a surplus that was marketed.
This was a credible system which produced tangible results, it addressed Zimbabwe’s needs.
Now if this system had spread to all the schools in the country, it is not impossible to imagine the explosion of production that would have taken place.
Schools would have been production centres that met their own needs and those of the surrounding communities and ultimately the nation.
The results would have been of mega proportions if the universities and tertiary institutions had also embraced education with production.
This would have led to the establishment of factories for the production of various goods at these institutions.
The billions of dollars invested in education since independence would have led to the creation of wealth that would meet the needs of Zimbabweans instead of graduates who one day hope to be employed by capitalist companies.
With our schools, colleges, and universities as production centres where theory becomes fruitful in production that responds to national priorities, we would have shot capitalism in the foot.
The production of goods and services by our schools and institutions of higher learning would compete favourably with capitalism because our production would not be driven by an insane profit motive.
The graduates from our institutions would be more inclined to set up their own productive enterprises than to seek employment under capitalism for they would be aware that production entails the production of wealth and there is no sense in producing for an individual or corporate to pocket the wealth.
Under education with production, there would be no dropouts standing around the corner selling air-time and cigarettes or mooning around factory corridors waiting for a chance vacancy.
They would be confidently, productively, using their skills somewhere.
There would be no pool of cheap labour for the capitalists to exploit at will.
State initiatives on entrepreneurship, indigenisation and employment creation would fall on very fertile soil, and they would take off.
The youths would already be equipped with business and productive skills from their schooling and the government initiatives would just be the impetus they need, and the state financial schemes would provide the means for take-off.
Education with production creates employment, creates goods for self-sufficiency as well a marketable surplus.
It equips learners to produce and to run their own enterprises.
It puts production of the material means of life in the hands of the people and not in the hands of a few capitalists.
It is the nemesis of capitalism.
Had education with production taken off at independence and spread to the rest of the nation’s schools and institutions of higher learning as was the plan of the founding fathers of Zimbabwe, we would not have been at the mercy of the capitalists in 2007-2008.
Kudonhedzwa kwedhora kana kusadonhedzwa kwaro, tingadai taive tichidya tichiguta savanhu vari munyika mavo.
What the founding fathers foresaw, the enemy also knew, and so education with production could not be allowed to flourish, too much was at stake for the survival of capitalism.