Q FM Africa's Modern Radio
Political Analyst Neo Simutanyi
Political analyst Neo Simutanyi has advised government to appreciate criticism regardless from whom it is coming from.
Dr Simutanyi says it is wrong in a democracy for a political party in power to qualify criticism from opposition political parties.
Dr. Simutanyi is of the view that criticism is criticism and is not supposed to be constructive.
He has told Qfm News by telephone that for the fact that some political parties are in opposition they are supposed to raise issues that are critical to the governing party.
Dr. Simutanyi who is also Center for Policy Dialogue (CPD) Executive Director has explained that this implies that in a democracy, it is not up to the political party in power to render any criticism from the opposition trivial or otherwise
He states that this is because when registered opposition political parties raise critical issues against the government they in fact do so on behalf of the people.
Dr Simutanyi says this means that when responding to any criticism a political party in power should address the issue that has been raised as opposed to responding to the individual political party that has spoken on behalf of the people.
He says this is because by bringing out what the government is doing wrong, the opposition political parties are in the actual sense suggesting to the people that if they were in power they would have done thinks differently.