Dangers of Government Stealing Intellectual Property

In today's bulletin of the Herald newspaper, as well as the News Day newspaper, the Minister of Primary and Secondary Education is reported to have engaged in a serious case of intellectual-property theft. Of course the ministry is facing a legal challenge. In due course, the plaintiff and the respondent will sort out their problem, but it is the implication of the case that I truly find very, very disturbing.

As per the reports, the plaintiff put together a proposal to design and use an electronic mode/software through which the parents of schoolchildren can apply for school places for said children. The plaintiff is said to have given a series of presentations before the ministry --- and the Herald categorically states that there is a physical trail of evidence to prove it. In place of working in tandem with the private entity that wants to move Zimbabwe into the digital world like most nations have done, the ministry is charged with what looks like makoronyera-style theft.

What I find concerning is the seeming dishonest and breach of trust on the part of the ministry. From my experience, and as a general rule, it is the role of the government to protect the property, intellectual and otherwise, of its citizens. What we have here, if it is true, is a dangerous precedent whereby a function of the government is acting in a manner that is at variance with what we expect.

Those of us who are actively creating intellectual knowledge and assets have to be shocked by what is transpiring here. It simply means that we will have to think not once or twice or thrice before sharing confidential intellectual property with this government; no, well will have to think about it a legion times. Cut and dissect it however you want it, the damage to the nation that may come out of this case is simply unfathomable. If Minister Dokora is not aware of this, we have to question his ability to see beyond immediate gains and ephemeral accolades. Simply put, no sane entrepreneur is going to share anything of value with this government if the officers in this ministry dismissively chuckle off the allegation of the brazen theft of intellectual property, precisely what Sylivia Utete-Masango is reported to have done upon being told about the charge of thievery.

More worrisome than this, innovative, imaginative and creative citizens of Zimbabwe will inevitably hog onto their ideas or simply go to countries with governments that foster and encourage innovation and creativity through the material support and protection of private innovation and entrepeneurship. When, on the other hand, the government decides to steal the intellectual property of private citizens, it is alarming. A government, by virtue of its very structure, is a behemoth. It takes great gumption and financial muscle to engage such a colossus in court. Victory for the private citizen or entity is far from guaranteed. Moreover, that victory may very well be pyrrhic, the kind of success that is actually ruinous.

To avoid all this rigmarole, anyone with cutting-edge innovations and technologies will have no choice but to protect that intellectual property instead of leaving it exposed to depredation by a government with functionaries that have predatory habits. You want to know one of the reasons that have caused the massive and injurious brain drain out of Africa, right? Read the piece entitled Dokora in E-Piracy Storm in the Herald's bulletin of the 15th of December 2016.

For every jot of blood that oozes out of an African country, figuratively speaking, that blood is guzzled up by some nation much to the latter's benefit. All you need to do is take a look at some of the patents applied by and granted to people who are Zimbabweans by birth. The nations that protect these innovations are getting the credit for the generation of ideas. Zimbabwe is getting nothing out of it. We can ill-afford to bleed in such a manner and hope to survive; factually, we cannot survive. In spite of this, we have a minister whose forename and surname are prefaced with a title that says he is very educated, much like the ministry's permanent secretary, Dr Utete-Masango. Rather than staunch the lethal haemorrhage, we may very well be worsening it, assuming the charge of intellectual theft is true.

Of course I cannot help but note that the property in question has been rolled out nationwide seemingly without conducting the imperative feasibility studies and the subsequent small-scale trial, all of which are part of what any middling project manager will tell you have to be performed. I can tell you that no matter how lucid a presentation on a technology or innovation is, that presentation barely scratches the surface. The finer details needed to make an oral or written idea actionable hardly get captured in the presentation or communication. There is no sufficient space for it.

Taking a presentation and trying to make something worthwhile come out of it is far worse than a complete waste of time. Imagine, if I may put it in the form of a metaphor, taking someone's house plan, his beams and bricks and corrugated sheets to construct a house on the plan without getting the tiny and but important grains of sand, cement particulates, nails, bolts and other widgets. One can pile up the bricks, the beams and sheets. The structure may very well look quite pleasing to the eyes of a fool. However, that structure will ultimately collapse. Yes, without the fine details, the aforementioned widgets, the structure will in due course turn into an unsightly ruble of badly broken bricks, splintered wood and mangled metal.

This is precisely what the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education is facing right now. Only yesterday I watched one of my nephews struggle mightily to register for school through online. The ministry's website was not working, perhaps it was simply overloaded. Here is exhibit number one that shows the detriment of the lack of basic knowledge of project management. The policy of using the internet to register children for school need not have been rolled out without the critical early stages that are fundamental to the application of any good but untested idea. The current glitches ought to have been caught and rectified during the feasibility and trial phases. That we were going to encounter such flaws is as guaranteed as the sun rising from the east and setting in the west. By the the time the ministry comes up with a remedy, assuming this is even possible, how much damage would have been caused?

One more point, does the roll out of this policy not presuppose that each and every parent has access to a computer and has the means to access internet facilities? I have in mind peasants in rural Zimbabwe. How does this ministry envisage the implementation of its policy in rural Zimbabwe?

Am I overthinking on this case, a real possibility on my part?

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