One factor, which discouraged members especially in Lifuwu cooperative from active participation, is the undemocratic way in which the leaders run the cooperative. The interviewed farmers indicated that they are not involved in the decision-making process. They also indicated that most decisions are just imposed on them, although they agreed that some are worthwhile decisions. Three cooperatives, in the study, all use a helpful structure, which ensures that everyone takes part in decision-making: the member’s views are captured in Figure 13.
Figure 13: Indication of the decision making process and information flow.
According to their by-laws, five steps were to be followed on some important decision- making:
The board and management meet to discuss the issue;
The zone chairperson calls a meeting to be briefed on the proposal and s/he is asked to take the proposal to the members;
The zone chairperson discusses the issue/s with the members and a consensus is reached;
The zone chairperson takes the decision/s, made by the members, back to the board meeting for a final decision;
The zone chairperson takes the final decision back to the members.
Malingunde, Mtunthama and Ndaula cooperatives use this structure of governing their cooperatives. Lifuwu used different committees, which were responsible for ensuring that different areas of the cooperative’s management were properly addressed. However, the farmers interviewed, in both cases, pointed out that they are not involved in decision making, because the zone chairperson does not discuss any issues with them. They believe that they are just there to receive information on what has been agreed at a higher level. This structure also acts as a channel for communication, which is an important feature in cooperative philosophy. Members of the Lifuwu cooperative indicated that communication is supposed to be two-way, but in their case, it was not so. The members
Board of Directors (farmer) Zone Chairman 1 (farmer) Zone Chairman 2 (farmer)
Zone Chairman 3 (farmer)
Zone members (farmers) Zone members farmers Zone members farmers
were just told what to do, or what was going to be done, without being given any opportunity to state what they would want: and yet, members’ meetings would be the correct place for members to air out their grievances, or challenge any decisions made without their agreement. One member states:
“…They would come to us when they have already made the decision on what to do, they do not ask the group first, so it is difficult for the farmers to say anything because we know that they have already made a decision”.
However, in all the cooperatives, members acknowledged the formal communication network, which occurs through an annual general meeting. This meeting is normally used to communicate cooperative policy matters and to provide information on the cooperative’s objectives and progress, in general.
At the Lifuwu cooperative (which did not have the same structures in place as the other three cooperatives), members felt that the undemocratic way of running the organisation contributed to the collapse of the cooperative. The cooperative had failed to call for meetings, because the turn out had been so low at previous meetings. The members interviewed indicated that they did not show up for the meetings, because they had not heard anything important being discussed. The farmers interviewed also indicated that the leadership, which was in place when the cooperative closed, was imposed on them and it was not elected by the group and this was not in accordance with their constitution. As one member states:
“What is expected is not being addressed that is why members feel it is a waste of time to attend the meeting”. We have the by-laws set by ourselves, term of office is set in the by-laws, when someone has stolen should be disciplined if does not change should be removed and so many things but the laws are not being followed because of lack of power of the members.
Leadership
Poor leadership was considered to have played an important role in the failure of the two unsuccessful cooperatives. One of the assessed cooperatives has collapsed, due to leadership failures in making correct decisions. The members cited two incidences, one where the first chairperson of the board misappropriated their money and members had to contribute extra shares, in order to revive the cooperative. The second incident involved another manager running away with their cash, which has resulted in the closure of the cooperative. In addition, the remaining assets were sold by the chairperson, without the knowledge of the members and there was no communication made to the members about the sale of their assets. This resulted in even more mistrust in their leadership. Although they have elected new leaders, the members still felt that the new ones could act in the same way, as quoted from one of the participants:
“...Some understood the situation but other were somehow discouraged. So when we asked the members to contribute an additional MK250 to boost up the capital due to the lost money, we discovered some members pulled out. We had about 1,500 members but when we asked to increase the shares the membership reduce to about 800”.
In Ndaula, Mtunthama and Lifuwu cooperatives, members expressed frustration at their leadership’s failure to provide worthwhile direction for the cooperative and to act in a transparent matter. There were incidences of leadership involvement in the mismanagement of resources. As a result, members viewed the leaders’ interest in holding the positions as being more of self–gratifying action, rather than it being for the benefit of members. As noted by one member of a cooperative (which is experiencing serious leadership wrangles, due to its leaders setting up some benefits for themselves):
“There was a time when management withdrew MK100,000 from the
cooperatives account, which they shared amongst some executive members. They tried to convince me to get some money from the coop account but I said that this is group’s money. And since I was not signatory to the account, they went ahead to withdraw the money and got Mk25, 000 each”.
A number of members stated that there is no effort made by the leaders to motivate the members to invest in the cooperatives as a result each member undertakes tasks, such as marketing on their own and there is poor participation by members in cooperative activities. One member states: “…we are not working as a group because there is no one to give us that authority, to bring us together and help each other. The leadership does not know what to do”.
One farmer I interviewed also expressed dissatisfaction at the leaders’ attitude in running the cooperative as captured by these sentiments:
“We sometimes feel cheated by these leaders because they are benefiting a lot from it while we the members who are meant to believe that we are the owners don’t see any benefits. We see them progressing while we are not getting anything not even a single dividend from the cooperative”.
Some members from Mtunthama, Ndaula and Lifuwu also indicated that leaders behave this way, because they know that the assets they reap from do not belong to them as one participants said:
“Because they know that it is not their property that is why they are ripping it off. They may show us the accounts but some of them are difficult to argue. They know that even if they are known to have stolen from the cooperative, they will just be removed from the position that is all”.
It was only Malingunde cooperative which reported competent leadership and this has had a positive impact on their survival, and this observation was supported by one of the key informant:
‘It is the board, they have a board which has a little experience and knowledge of what they are doing, but are committed to see things work’.