Posted on 05/07/2006 11:41:46 PM PDT by MadIvan
Zimbabweans are speaking out with candour against the Government as the country descends further into economic chaos
WITH his torn shirt and tattered trousers held up by a piece of string, Barons Chikamba is an unlikely millionaire.
His life is a daily struggle despite the seemingly astronomical prices that he charges for even a short hop in the battered car that he uses to ferry visitors around Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare.
Even his lowest fare is more than a million Zimbabwean dollars. It may sound a lot, but in a country where even the official rate of inflation is nearly 1,000 per cent — by far the highest for a country not at war — it is really less than £6.
Visitors arriving at Harare’s smart, modernistic airport quickly become millionaires simply by changing $10 at the official rate of Z$101,000 (55p) to the US dollar. The black market rate is roughly double that. “Yes, I am a millionaire — a millionaire who can afford nothing at all,” Mr Chikamba says. “Zimbabweans are all millionaires today.
We are a country of millionaires, but it goes nowhere and no one has anything.”
Mr Chikamba chuckles at the thought, but for him and millions like him, Zimbabwe’s hyperinflation is no joke. Last week the basket of essential basics that an average lowincome family needs for survival rocketed to Z$41 million a month in a country where more than 60 per cent of the workforce is jobless and others earn as little as Z$4 million a month.
With the highest denomination banknote, Z$50,000, it can take almost as long as a taxi journey itself to pay the fare.
That is nothing, however, compared with eating out. A takeaway chicken and chips cost The Times Z$1.8 million last week. A curry with friends at a down-market Indian restaurant came to Z$13.6 million.
When restaurant bills arrive, people sit like Las Vegas high-rollers with great stacks of money in the middle of the table. “You have to add on another half hour to allow for the restaurant to count the money,” an Indian businessman said. “I went to pay some local taxes the other day and it took over an hour for them to count out the Z$41 million I owed. It’s crazy.”
That explains why some of the hottest commodities in Zimbabwe today are money-counting machines. State-run newspapers are full of advertisements for heavy-duty banknote counters made in Japan or Singapore. They range in price from Z$345 million to Z$1.2 billion. One businessman said that he had stopped using a calculator because it simply could not deal with the number of zeros, and had reverted to using an old slide rule.
Zimbabwe’s smallest denomination banknote is Z$500. That is a fraction of the price of a roll of lavatory paper at Z$150,000, leading to inevitable jokes about how to express one’s point of view of Robert Mugabe’s regime.
Supermarkets post new prices daily. Items such as bags of sugar or rice have layers of price tags stuck one on top of another. Peel them back and it is possible to trace the increases, which can be as high as 80 per cent in a week. People stand in shops with two bags, one full of money, one with a handful of food. At one of the favourite watering holes for the dwindling number of expats, a white man walked in and slammed a brick on the table. He had just bought 15 of them for some repair work at a cost of Z$300,000. “The bloody house only cost me Z$200,000 in 1990 — and it has a swimming pool and tennis court,” he shouted.
Zimbabwe’s crisis transcended racial divisions long ago, and his statement set off a round of comparisons from the mixed-race crowd. One man related how a new battery for his car now costs about Z$200,000, more than the car did when he bought it for Z$140,000 in the late 1990s.
Stroking his stubble, an Asian hotelier lamented that he could not afford razor blades at Z$15 million for a packet of three. “Bugger it, I won’t shave; who cares any more?” he shrugged.
As ever in Mr Mugabe’s impoverished fiefdom, it is the poorest people who pay the highest price. “People now have to shop on a daily basis because they cannot afford more than a few meagre items, and they get confused with all the money,” Otilia Rusere, 37, who scrapes a living as a street vendor, said.
By 5am the streets of Harare are full of people walking to work. “Many people cannot afford public transport, so everyone is footing it,” said Rudo Tsikira, whose rent for her one-room dwelling has soared to Z$2 million a month.
On Sunday mornings pensioners, black and white, can be seen buying one egg and two tomatoes, and a quarter loaf of bread for a rare treat — a cooked breakfast.
The grand colonial Harare Club started locking its library long ago because members were stealing books and newspapers and selling them to raise a little extra cash.
Fees tripled last month in state hospitals, with basic consultations increasing from Z$300,000 to more than Z$1 million. Private hospitals, doctors and clinics doubled their fees. Last week a couple expecting a baby in a private clinic had to pay for the delivery in advance. They turned up with a large suitcase stuffed with money. “People thought we were checking in,” joked the father-to-be.
The cost of dying is so high that the poor are reportedly burying their relatives in fields at night. Only condoms, which cost $Z300 because they are heavily subsidised by the international community, seem inflation-proof.
With the currency worth less each day, a bartering system is taking hold. Farm labourers prefer to be paid in produce, which will keep its price and can be easily swapped. In cities, people exchange personal items, such as CDs, for food.
The country’s descent into economic chaos came after violent land seizures led to a dramatic drop in production. Exports plummeted. Foreign investment dried up. The Government sought to hide its problems by taking out foreign loans that it could not service, and printing money. The inflation rate is still spiralling upwards, but Mr Mugabe appears oblivious.
He has a simple remedy to the problem — printing more money. To ensure that the army, police and civil servants are paid, the Central Bank has said that it will print another Z$60 trillion in Z$50,000 notes. The country does not have the capacity to print so many notes, but Mr Mugabe refuses to have larger ones because that would be “inflationary”.
Instead, Zimbabwe, once one of the wealthiest countries in Africa, will have to sub- contract some of the printing to neighbouring states, who will demand payment in precious hard currency, compounding the crisis.
“We are rapidly approaching the point of meltdown,” said John Robertson, an independent economist. “It simply cannot go on, and the Government will be forced to admit it has failed. Economics may end up doing what politics has failed to do.”
He said that until now the worst effects had been partially offset by remittances from the four million Zimbabweans, a quarter of the population, living outside the country.
There are signs that ordinary people are near to breaking point. Despite the ubiquitous security services, they speak their minds with a candour unimaginable even a few years ago. No one has a good word to say about the Government.
Last week more than 100 women protesting against massive increases in school fees were arrested in Bulawayo. In Harare about 50 students who could not afford the final term’s fees were also arrested and detained over the weekend.
Zimbabwe’s schools reopen tomorrow and huge absenteeism is expected after many doubled fees that now range between Z$20 million and Z$100 million a term.
“There is no sector of society unaffected by this crisis,” said Barnabus Mangodla, of the Combined Harare Residents’ Association, a lobby group.
“We are living on a time bomb, and there comes a point when people have nothing left, that they no longer care about repression.”
Regards, Ivan
Ping!
There are parts of the US where folks worth just a million or two can't afford a really nice house.
Strange...and I know it sounds crazy to most freepers
There are parts of the US where folks worth just a million or two can't afford a really nice house.
Strange...and I know it sounds crazy to most freepers
Yikes!
Wait, wasn't this guy a confiscate from the rich whites to redistribute to the poor blacks?
Isn't that Democratic policy?
Hasn't it been for decades?
Anyone make that connection?
It's true.
Typically the money is tied up - not liquid.
I could not afford to buy my own home now.
Where I live any home under 250/foot is a deal and I'm in Nashville not Westchester.
I looked at a home that sold for 220K back in 98, 525K in 2003 and asking 795K now
and we thought it was a deal...not that we could afford it
some schlub with a net worth of one to two million ain't gonna be buying a house like that....normally unless is income is also 3-400K/year
Zimbabwe a glimpse into a democratic future under the power hungry Communists who today refer to themselves as "progressives.
What's missing from the article is the key word: Communism.
Mugabe is a communist. His army is staffed with communists.
Communism has failed in Zimbabwe, failed in the CCCP, failed in Cuba, and failed in North Korea.
The Army can take over Zimbabwe, but what are they going to change? They are communists. The communist answer is price controls, enforced at gunpoint.
Antonio Gramsci said that true Communism would *always* fail as the people/workers would eventually come to see the ruling Communists in the same light as they once viewed the ruling class in capitalistic societies...as the new boss...leading to inevitable popular rebellions against communism itself.
This happened first in Poland under Lech Walensa, then East Germany and Czechoslavakia and Romania et al. It will happen in Cuba once Castro dies. It will happen in North Korea.
And it will most certainly happen in Zimbabwe...
...but the question there is what will replace it?!
A rebellion or coup by the Army would likely as not lead to totalitarianism, martial law, or a far harsher version of Communism than Mugabe's current failure...hardly an improvement for the people there.
And the population at large of Zimbabwe isn't educated enough to grasp the benefits of capitalism or democracy. Their main real hope is a benevolent dictator or tribal law/rule, save for a re-colonization by the West.
At least most African tribal law permits low-level capitalism (buy/sell/trade by individuals).
In the near-term, an outright invasion of Zimbabwe by one of its neighbors is a very real possibility...and explains Mugabe's otherwise ridiculous purchase of new combat fighter jets.
good for you...we often think about cashing out and going country but my businesses are here
I feel very sorry for this poor blighter, but it's really really hard not to laugh.
Is that bad?
L
A few years ago I paid $24,000 for two beers at a hotel near Victoria Falls. No one knew what to charge for anything. No one could make change. Workers could not cash their pay checks and were forced to leave the full amount wherever they went to buy even a small needed item. Seems that hyperinflation in Zimbabwe now like Nazi Germany times, where wheelbarrows were needed to bring the money for a loaf of bread.
This ruthless dictator is what the supporters of socialism bring to this world. In the U.S. they call themselves "progressives." Left to their own devices this is what they bring to countries they take over. The nationalizing of the farms and stealing them from whites has led Africa's properous bread basket to become an empty basket with maize now unaffordable for making bread and thus a starving population. All because of a failed system called Communism.
Plus it's way easier to waste the above mentioned poor bastards in the streets and steal what they have than it will be to get to Mugabe. He may be evil, but he ain't completely stupid. He'll have himself some first class security folks paid for with real cash money, not that pretty colored paper the locals are stuck with.
Zimbabwe is about to get real ugly, real fast Southack. You mark my words on that.
L
I was able to take my job with me. Now I work from my home. No commute. More work space that is totally under my control. Lower rates to my customers...I'm not using a company supplied office, thus that is removed from my "loaded" rate. I still have as much out of town travel as before, but it starts from Pocatello instead of San Diego. Nominally that costs me about 3 extra hours of travel time each way when flying.
Is this the same Antonio Gramsci -- Bill Clinton's hero -- who finished his days in prison after Mussolini outlawed the Communist Party? (i.e., "socialist vs. socialist")
Why are you sourcing that guy?
(Denny Crane: "Every one should carry a gun strapped to their waist. We need more - not less guns.")
Is that bad?
Frankly, yeah, it is.
"There but for the grace of God go you or I."
Thankfully, by an accident of birth, we were born in a free country. Those who suffer in unthinkable bondage merit our sympathy, not our mirth.
The other day, that smarmy lawyer dude on Fox -- "Greg" something, the one with the slick hair (every hair always in place) and the always-pastel necktie -- was laughing at a video of a bear cub in some FSU country who had his head stuck in a plastic container -- for several days. The poor thing was stumbling around in abject terror -- starving and dehydrating, as well as slowly suffocating, blindly flailing about as it vainly tried to free itself.
That fool was literally laughing out loud, peppering his laughter with statements about how he just had to laugh, because it was so funny. What a mean, base, vile little prick he was.
The other "on-air personalities" could not believe what they were hearing, and tried to reason with him. This was clearly NOT a "scripted moment."
In the end, a courageous guy, a stocky fellow who looked to be in his fifties, managed to duck the claws long enough to free the bear, who made a bee-line for the water, to slake its thirst. The bastard broke out in more laughter at the sight.
I'm sure I personalized this somewhat. I recently lost a pet who was very special to me. She was not only a very good friend, extremely loyal and affectionate, but, she was young, only a few years old, and her death was totally unexpected.
When we rescued her, she had the jagged broken glass mouth of a Mason jar snugged around her throat like a tight necklace. She had somehow gotten her head into a jar, and then managed to break it off -- without cutting her throat or slashing her eyes -- before she suffocated or dehydrated to death. How many days she stumbled around in that state of torture, unable to eat or drink, breathing stale air, her cries of terror echoing in her ears, I will never know, until we are united in Heaven. (Yes, like C.S. Lewis, I believe that God cares for our pets in Heaven.)
Afterward, her head and neck grew to the point that the glass ring could not be removed. She was still a kitten. It wouldn't have been long before she'd have grown large enough for it to strangle her, or, slash her jugular veins. After we managed to trap her, the vet had to anesthetize her and chip it off piece by piece.
I cannot imagine the horror my little friend endured, alone, in the months before she staggered up to our doorstep.
Cruelty to animals just plain sucks, and cruelty to people is to put it mildly, no better.
I am not an "animal-rights" loon. Today, while planting my onion seedlings in my garden, I saw the biggest, fattest cottontail rabbit I've ever seen in my life. Literally. I had an instant vision of him getting fatter yet on my onions -- and garlic, and peas, and melons, and okra, and...
And, I drew my .45 and fired off seven rounds. Unfortunately, at ~30 yards, I did not hit the bastard. (If he was human-sized he'd be in rabbit heaven -- it is very irritating to watch a puff of dirt waft up about five inches from the bunny!)
Tomorrow, I set out the trap -- the same trap I used to catch my little friend who left this world a few short weeks ago. I'm making progress. I only get a lump in my throat when I tell about her, instead of having tears run down my ugly mug.
I distinguish between livestock, game, varmints, and domestic pets -- and, people.
It has been my observation that people who are cruel to animals are inevitably cruel to people too, although it may take a few years for it to manifest. In the case of the lawyer-cum-"on-air personality" who got his day's entertainment laughing at the suffering and terror of young bear, I suspect he's had his moments "in private practice" prior to his engagement at Fox. Pure speculation, of course -- but cruelty tends to run deep in the soul.
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