THREE elderly members of an Indian family have been arrested on charges of defrauding a British citizen of £67 400 in a travel scam.

By Harriet Chikandiwa

Musa Ahmed Yousaf (83), former director of Carefree Travel, Musa Akil Yousaf (51), Yousaf Aisha Musa (80), former managing director of Carefree Travel, as well as Rutendo Berejena (44), who is also a director of the company, appeared before Harare magistrate Victoria Mushamba, who granted them $1 000 bail each.

They were remanded to November 27 for possible trial.

The complainant is British-based Mohammed Ahmed.

Allegations are that sometime in September 2017, the accused persons allegedly misrepresented to Ahmed that Carefree Travel was in need of capital injection in order to finance a facility which they claimed to have with Emirates Airlines.

It is alleged that Emirates would enable Carefree Travel to buy tickets at discounted prices for resale to its customers, yet in actual fact they knew that no such facility
existed.

Because of the misrepresentation, Ahmed injected £67 400 into Carefree Travel, which he lost and nothing was recovered.

ANCHORED on public pre-budget consultations, the process to formulate the 2020 National Budget Statement is underway. Public participation during budget formulation is fundamental. Citizens and civil society must grab the opportunity to influence how public revenues are generated and allocated to address the stubborn challenges posed by inequality and poverty.

Obviously, citizen participation must not be restricted to budget input, but across the whole value chain of service delivery. This entails public participation in processes which determine how public resources are raised, allocated, disbursed, spent and accounted for to ensure progressive realisation of socio-economic rights embodied in the Constitution.

The nation is quite plugged in on the increasingly domineering role of mining in the economy.

Therefore, it is critical for civil society organisations like the Zimbabwe Environment Law Association (ZELA) to give input on how the budget can hinge more on mining potential on domestic resource mobilisation.

An input harvested through multi-stakeholder engagement meetings which feed into the provincial and national alternative mining indabas. Primarily, the focus on such indabas is to push for conducive policy and practise reforms to have grip for the slippery sustainable development dividend from mining. Recently, government launched its strategy to realise a US$12 billion mining economy by 2023.

Given this significant development, it is imperative to influence the budget formulation to ensure the national budget is primed to capture a fair share of revenue from this anticipated remarkable growth.

Below are key pointers of how the 2020 National Budget Statement must enhance mining fiscal linkages by ensuring greater transparency and accountability. Essentially, the pointers raised here are not new; resource rich communities have made such demands for years, with mixed success.

Deliver transparency reforms

Six years have passed now since the new Constitution was adopted in 2013, but mining sector transparency reforms as required by the new Constitution remain a mirage.

The Constitution requires an Act of Parliament to guide negotiation and performance of mining agreements to ensure transparency, honesty, cost-effectiveness and competitiveness, Section 315 (2) (c). With the launch of a strategy to realise US$12 billion contribution from the mining sector by 2023, more mega mining deals are in the pipeline. The secrecy around how these deals are negotiated must be ended as required by the Constitution. Further, existing and new deals must be monitored to ensure mining growth is not unhinged from national budget contribution. As such, the budget must set the context for Parliament to review the fiscal terms of past, new and prospective mining mega deals.

Public financial management principles embedded in the Constitution under Section 298 requires transparency and accountability in all financial matters among others. The budget, therefore, must put in place tangible steps to harness low hanging fruits to deliver mining tax revenue transparency reforms. Low hanging fruits include the disclosure of mining sector performance across each revenue head and the revenue performance of key mining sectors like gold, platinum, diamonds, chrome and coal, for example. Already, the country’s tax collector, the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra), is disclosing quarterly and annual tax revenue performance reports per revenue head. Such revenue heads include corporate income tax (CIT), customs duty, royalties, withholding tax, Pay As You Earn (Paye) and Value Added Tax (Vat).

There is room to fine tune such reports to track the performance of the mining sector.

The Budget can also borrow inspiration from how the Intermediated Mobile Money Transfer Tax is handled in order to improve mineral revenue transparency. This can be done by earmarking a portion of mining revenue, 50% for instance, towards human development and infrastructure programmes.

Further, billboards can be erected to show clinics, schools, roads and dams being funded by revenue from diamonds, platinum, gold and other minerals. By doing so, the budget can send the message to citizens that the depletion of the country’s mineral reserves through mining is not a plunder of resources, but a catalyst for sustainable development.

Another milestone which the upcoming budget must deliver is disclosure of the tax incentives. That is, tax revenue forgone to attract investments in the mining sector. Disclosure of tax incentives is fundamental to fulfil the promise made in the 2019 National Budget Statement on monitoring and evaluation of tax incentives.

The 2020 budget must give a clear update on funding for modernising the mining title administration system; a computerised mining cadastre. The current mining cadastre is outdated, a source of claim ownership disputes and a corruption enabler. It is critical that the budget addresses perennial nagging challenges associated with funding for computerising the cadastre mining system.

In the medium term, focus should be on adoption and implementation of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI) to enable open and accountable governance of the mining sector. Remarkably, the 2020 pre-budget strategy paper embraces EITI. Concreate steps, such as the creation of a multi-stakeholder grouping and budgeting for implementation of EITI, must be included in the budget.

Review platinum royalties

A commitment was made in the 2018 National Budget Statement to review platinum royalties by August 2019. A result of the lowering of platinum royalty rate from 10% to 2,5% is to ensure equity and fairness among all platinum players.

Prior to this arrangement, ordinary platinum lease holders, Mimosa specifically, was paying a 10% royalty rate while special lease holders like Zimplats and Unki mine were paying a 2,5% royalty rate. Given that the Midterm Budget Review in August failed to review platinum royalties as promised, it is critical for the 2020 National Budget to review platinum royalties upwards to increase mining tax revenue contribution.

As it stands, platinum royalty rates are now half the rate of the gold sector and higher than those for base metals by 0,5 percentage points.

Share the wealth

Previous budget instruments are responsible for dismantling the indigenisation and economic empowerment framework, in the process removing legal backing for Community Share Ownership Trusts (CSOTs).

We now need a vehicle tailored to hinge sustainable local economic and social development on mining. The right of communities to benefit from resources in their localities is a Constitutional issue through Section 13 (40 of the Constitution.

Therefore, the Budget must embrace mineral revenue sharing arrangements between the central government and local governments. For instance, 20% of mineral royalties must be ploughed back to areas from where the resources are extracted. That way, CSOTs will have a sustainable revenue stream to finance local development.

The road ahead

Policy coherence is an important ingredient for government to spearhead sustainable and broad-based socio-economic development. Now that the Ministry has a strategy to realise a US$12 billion mining economy by 2023, the national budget must clearly speak to the mining fiscal linkages hinged on this remarkable projected growth.

The journey towards EITI must be marked with clear road signs which are to be benchmarked with constitutional requirements, tax and contract transparency. It is imperative that a budget which dismantled legal backing for CSOTs should come up with measures to ensure communities benefit from resources in their areas, as required by the Constitution. In this regard, government must consider mineral revenue sharing arrangements with communities from where resources are extracted.

 Mukasiri Sibanda is an economic governance officer at the Zimbabwe Environmental Lawyers Association. He writes in his personal capacity

A LOCAL energy company has urged Zimbabwe to turn to solar as hydro-power was becoming more expensive and vulnerable to the vagaries of nature.

BY PRECIOUS CHIDA

Speaking on the sidelines of the launch of its new branch in Guruve yesterday, Zonful Energy chief executive officer William Ponela said there was need to ensure that every household generates its own energy.

“If you look at the cost of hydro power over solar, hydro has become too high and it doesn’t make sense for us to continue using it,” he said.

“Our solar panels are now wireless unlike the traditional way of solar connections. It has become cheaper so you can see that the conversions in technology have made it easier for people to move to solar.”

Ponela said the organisation was targeting to power 20 000 households in Guruve district and one million countrywide by 2025.

Energy minister Fortune Chasi commended Zonful for bringing clean and affordable energy to rural communities.

“At least, 80% of the rural population in Zimbabwe is off-grid which means these areas have no grid connections and they are using unsafe energy sources. I, therefore, commend the Zonful Energy team for its unwavering efforts to bring clean and affordable energy to both the peri-urban and the rural communities of Zimbabwe,” he said.

Zonful donated solar lights and other gadgets to traditional leaders and pupils at primary schools.

THE government is failing to properly explain its on-going austerity measures, resulting in most people looking at the current establishment as a failure, Defence and War Veterans deputy minister Victor Matemadanda has said.

By Rex Mphisa

Matemadanda, who is the ruling Zanu PF party commissar, said to achieve economic stability, the new dispensation led by President Emerson Mnangagwa, embarked on financial discipline and other measures to boost government coffers.

This, he said, was bound to cause suffering, but had long-term positive effects.

“The last dispensation did not have financial discipline that resulted in printing of unsupported bond notes. President Mnangagwa embarked on austerity measures to re-rail the economy, but these have not been properly communicated to the people,” he said.

Matemadanda said Mnangagwa was clear that the recovery path would be an uphill task.

“These (austerity measures) have to be packaged well such that everyone knows where we are going and what we are going through,” he said.

Matemadanda was addressing war veterans, war collaborators and widows of liberation war heroes in Beitbridge on Thursday.

“(The late former President Robert) Mugabe’s dispensation bled the economy. Zimbabwe is like a person being treated of extreme blood loss whose recovery is painful,” he said.

Zimbabwe has of late been witnessing a wave of fuel price hikes and other commodities which has left people believing Mugabe was better that his successor who assumed power following a coup.
Matemadanda said war veterans had a role to explain the austerity measures to people in their areas.

He urged war veterans to resist regional politics and elect party officials on merit rather than connections.

“We are holding our district co-ordination committee elections countrywide and you must elect people according to performance, not who they know,” he said.

Matemadanda said his visit to Beitbridge brought him face-to-face with the drought and he would advise the President on the urgent need to bring food relief for both humans and livestock in the district.

More than 1 000 cattle have succumbed to effects of the drought in Beitbridge.

MEDIA defence lawyer Chris Mhike has said President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government was similar to that of the late former President Robert Mugabe in terms of committing violence against journalists.

BY FARAI MATIASHE

Speaking during commemorations to mark International Day to End Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists in Harare yesterday, Mhike said he was concerned about the rise in cases of harassment and assault of journalists in the country.

The day is commemorated on November 2 every year.

“We also want to take note of the fact that the statistics of violence against the media leave a lot to be desired. There have been too many arrest of journalists and assaults. We have seen journalist also being threatened by all sorts of players, not just government,” he said.

“As a legal defence attorney, I have been extremely busy, particularly in the period 2018-2019.

The incidents of harassment of journalists have been rising phenomenally and we are constantly referring to the second republic doing things differently.

“We will not be able to achieve that dream to differentiate the second republic from the first republic, with the recent statistics that we have been hearing in the past months or in the past two years in particular.”

Mhike said it was the duty of the State to safeguard the safety of journalists as required by the Constitution.

“The most important role in terms of protection of journalist lies with the State. The State wields power in protection of journalists. The government is placed at a vantage point in terms of making sure that violations come to an end and that journalists do enjoy the rights that are given to them under the Constitution,” he said.

Mhike called on the State to hold accountable perpetrators of violence against journalists.

National Peace and Reconciliation Commission commissioner Geoffrey Chada said working in peace was a human right, thus journalists should not be harassed.

Information ministry director for international communication services, Ivanoe Gurira, said journalists should wear vests labelled Press so that it is easier for security services to distinguish them from the people they would be covering, especially during demonstrations and protests.

But in a statement, Media Institute of Southern Africa-Zimbabwe Chapter said some of the cases involving the assaults or unlawful arrests of journalists have reportedly been perpetrated by the police and other State security agents, the very same agents that are supposed to protect journalists and the citizens in general.

Recent cases include the assault of Ruvimbo Muchenje, a journalist with Alpha Media Holdings, who sustained injuries after the police assaulted her with batons during running battles between the cops and vendors in Harare’s central business district last month.

FINANCE minister Mthuli Ncube and his Labour ministry counterpart Sekai Nzenza are in a quandary as civil servants yesterday declared a massive demonstration next Wednesday over unfulfilled promises by government.

BY VENERANDA LANGA

The Apex Council leadership said yesterday they have had enough of unfulfilled promises by government on salary demands.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s broke government has repeatedly said it could not afford the demand while the International Monetary Fund warned that a civil servants’ salary hike would trigger inflation.

Apex Council organising secretary Charles Chinosengwa told NewsDay that the
workers’ body had already given notice to the police of the strike, where they also expect all 16 civil service unions, including the health professions to join in.

Currently, Ncube is in Victoria Falls where he is discussing 2020 budget proposals with legislators and other stakeholders.

The civil servants plan to march to his offices on Wednesday next week.

Chinosengwa said civil servants now want the lowest paid to be remunerated US$475 equivalent at the prevailing intermarket bank rate in the face of the spiralling cost of living, where the bread basket for a family of six is now pegged at $4 000.

“The Apex Council met yesterday (Wednesday) and the main agenda was to discuss on lack of feedback by government on our demands, whereby the employer promised to come back to us within two weeks, but there has been no response,” he said.

“We met with different civil servants’ unions to discuss the issue of incapacitation and we were not amused that the Finance minister (Ncube) went to the Press to announce that we, civil servants, will get cost of living adjustments — which we have not yet got, but immediately after his statement prices of basic commodities began to shoot up.

“Yesterday, we then wrote to his counterpart the Minister of Labour Nzenza telling her that it is now two weeks after they said they will commit to our salary adjustments. As a result, Apex Council has resolved to engage in a demonstration next Wednesday in Harare, which will include all civil servants, and right now, we are in the process of notifying the police.”

Chinosengwa said the demonstrators will gather at Public Service House and then march to Ncube’s Finance ministry offices with a petition.

“We want them to adjust our salaries to the interbank rate so that they are in tandem with the October 2017 salaries of US$475 for the lowest paid worker. The reason why we are demanding rating of salaries with the interbank rate is because the food bread basket has gone up to $4 000 for a family of six,” he said.

“We have given notice to all 16 civil servants’ unions to join us. We are also planning to invite the Health Apex to also join us in the demonstration.”

The Apex Council organising secretary said civil servants were struggling and heavily indebted as they were borrowing money to report to work.

He said if government does not heed their call, then they will embark on weekly demonstrations or sit-ins.

Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe president Takavafira Zhou said he hoped that the demonstration by the Apex Council was a sincere move.

“We were not part of the meeting, but all along, we believed that the Apex Council is part of the problem and if there are going to be demonstrations, then we say ‘welcome to our world’ to them.

Ours had been incapacitation, whereby our members are currently on strike and reporting to work only two days in a week, on Monday and Friday with effect from October 21,” he said.

“All along, we were trying to extend our hands to our colleagues the Apex Council and Zimta [Zimbabwe Teachers Association], but now we welcome them and we hope they are sincere and that they are not being sent by government to disturb the process that we had already begun.”

Zhou said the PTUZ perceived demonstrations as useless and they favoured stayaways as there will be no services rendered.

“We want real action. This government will not listen to demonstrations and petitions. It is just firefighting and buying time. There is need for action for government to take action,” he said.

OPPOSITION MDC leader Nelson Chamisa has described proposals by the clergy for the suspension of elections for seven years as an “extra-ordinary” and “difficult” ask, with legal and constitutional ramifications.

BY NQOBANI NDLOVU

Chamisa said the MDC remains open to suggestions to solve the country’s multi-faceted crisis, but argued that any suspension of elections would need a buy-in of Zimbabweans through platforms such as referendums.

The Zimbabwe Heads of Christian Denominations (ZHOCD), a grouping of the clergy made up of the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches, the Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe and the Union for the Development of Apostolic Churches in Zimbabwe, recently called for a moratorium on elections and a unified approach in solving all issues affecting the nation.

ZHOCD said the position was built on the proposal from the Zimbabwe Heads of Christian Denominations Episcopal Conference held at the Large City Hall in Bulawayo in May this year.

“I acknowledge receipt of your communication, entitled Call for national Sabbath for trust and confidence building, which I have read and studied with great interest and deep introspection. I have also discussed it with my colleagues in the leadership,” Chamisa wrote in his response to ZHOCD executive secretary Kenneth Mtata on October 28.

“I observe that your call for the seven-year Sabbath is one such proposition in response to the question. Although details are limited, I observe that it calls for a halt in elections and electioneering for a period of seven years. Without going into detail, I observe that it is an extra-ordinary proposition. A very difficult proposition …

“This is because it has significant legal and constitutional implications since our national Constitution provides for regular elections. Such a proposition would have to be backed by the people of Zimbabwe through the opposite platforms.”

Mtata yesterday confirmed receipt of Chamisa’s response when contacted for comment.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has also rejected the calls for the suspension of elections, describing the proposals as ultra vires the country’s Constitution which calls for the holding of regular elections.

“This Constitution is the supreme law of Zimbabwe and any law, practice, custom or conduct inconsistent with it is invalid to the extent of the inconsistency,” Mnangagwa argued in his response.

Chamisa added that the MDC was indebted to the clergy for expressing concerns over the country’s crisis, adding that the opposition party will not stand “in the way of practical solutions … as long as such solutions are based upon a constitutional mandate that is derived from the people of Zimbabwe”.

“I am humbled by the effort you put into this call and by your desire and commitment to Zimbabwe’s well-being and success during this period of great difficulty. Personally, both as a man of faith and leader of our party, the MDC, I’m greatly indebted to the scriptures and it is good to see the clergy providing a guiding hand,” the MDC leader added.

“Our position is and has always been guided by the best interest of Zimbabwe and our party’s founding democratic values and principles which include, but not limited to, holding of regular, free and fair elections.”

DANCEHALL fans in the gold mining town of Kadoma and surrounding areas have something to smile about this weekend as Ninja president Winky D appears to have gathered the courage to perform at the Braai Fest themed concert on November 9 at The Odyssey Hotel in Kadoma.

BY WINSTONE ANTONIO

The long-awaited return of Winky D to Kadoma, where he will share the stage with fellow chanter Enzo Ishall, is a make-up performance after he pulled out of a scheduled show at the same venue on New Year’s Eve citing security fears.

This followed threats on his life by gold panners, infamously known as MaShurugwi, who had voiced their anger over the chanter’s politically-charged track, Kasong Kejecha, in which he is believed to throw pot shots at President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration.

Concert promoter Tich Mharadze of 2 Kings Entertainment yesterday told NewsDay Life &Style that they had agreed with the Musarova Bigman hitmaker that he descends on Kadoma for their annual Braai Fest themed “Family Show” at The Odyssey Hotel.

“In a professional way of doing business, Winky D will be performing at a family show at The Odyssey Hotel on November 9 alongside fellow dancehall singer Enzo Ishall. The programme of the day starts at 10am and entrance will be free before 11am as the show will end at 7pm,” he said.

The award-winning promoter said the one-hour free entry between 10 and 11am is meant to accord the community an opportunity to be part of the concert.

“This Braai Fest is our annual event for the Kadoma community where we bring them some of the country’s big music stars whom they don’t usually have the opportunity to watch live on the stage,” he said.

“The economy is tough, but people still need entertainment so those who can’t afford can come early for free.”

With a record of not usually disappointing on his set and also outshining some international dancehall stars, Winky D will definitely be out to maintain his dominance on stage, guaranteeing fans high level of entertainment.

On the other hand, Enzo Ishall, famed for the plug tracks Kanjiva and Smart Rinotangira Kutsoka, is not a pushover as he is also setting himself up as a force to reckon with through his sterling performances that have been well received by music fans.

Off the stage, on the turntables there will be DJ Knox, Templeman and Gary B.

On Friday last week the Sadc region as a whole mounted a coordinated protest against the European and American-targeted sanctions against Zimbabwe. I am a veteran of the United Nations (UN) mandatory sanctions programme mounted against Rhodesia after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965. Although it is a long time ago, the programme was one of the toughest set of sanctions ever imposed by the UN on a delinquent State. The sanctions were absolute on trade, financial transactions and movement. They were reinforced by an armed blockade of the main port of the country at Beira in Mozambique.

I was a junior economist with the Agricultural Marketing Authority which was at the time the largest business organisation in the country. Because of my political views at the time as a well-known activist, I was regarded as a security risk by the government and the Minister of Justice called for me to be dismissed from the authority because of our key role in sanctions. Fortunately for me the chairman of the board refused to do so. In the next 12 years, we battled sanctions as agriculture generated half of all exports. We were involved in about US$1,5 billion of foreign trade per year. It is a great pity that so many who were involved in that exercise are no longer with us as it would have made a marvellous story. Their ingenuity and enterprise was amazing and we had people in the authority with global connections and who spoke a dozen languages. Most of the records of that era were destroyed at Independence in 1980. We built alternative infrastructure in record time and we used many different routes and means of delivering our products and returning the funds generated therefrom, to our local banks.

Despite the effort put into the sanctions, Rhodesia thrived. Import substitution grew the industrial sector and after three years agriculture was back to full production — only more diversified. Despite the sanctions, the Rhodesian dollar maintained its value against other currencies. Although the authorities were proud of the secrecy in which these sanction-busting efforts were being made, I now know that the major Western nations knew pretty much what we were doing. Even the Soviets played along and when we were caught with millions of dollars of exports in Maputo in 1975 after then Mozambican leader Samora Machel closed the border. It was the Russians who bought the whole lot for cash and eventually we were paid.

Apart from the cynicism of any sanctions, in the end it was not sanctions that brought change to both Rhodesia and South Africa. In the end it was the liberation war plus brute political force on the part of the United States that ended the Ian Smith regime. In South Africa it was the UK Premier Margaret Thatcher government that simply threatened to force the country out of global financial systems that finally the National Party decided that they had to accept change. What the UN underestimated when they tried to make the Rhodesians change by imposing sanctions, was the strength of relationships across the world and the fact that the regime in Salisbury had many friends and sympathisers in many places. They also underestimated the response of the private sector who, when pushed against the wall, fought for survival. In the process, contrary to their stated objectives, many local individuals made a fortune in the process and were certainly not in favour of any changes.

The new Zimbabwe government was no angel of light. In a savage campaign from 1983 to 1987, they committed genocide against the supporters of the only effective opposition in the form of Zapu. Tens of thousands died and hundreds of thousands fled the country for safety. The West, not one of them, took any action and turned a blind eye to the whole shameful episode. From 1987 to 1997, the Robert Mugabe regime simply crushed any opposition and maintained a one-party State that brooked no opposition and rapidly became one of the most corrupt and dictatorial States in Africa.

Throughout this period, Western criticism of Mugabe and his colleagues was at best, muted. It was only when the trade unions took to the field and created the Movement for Democratic Change and began to agitate for the dismantling of the one-party State and the adoption of a new Constitution, that the basic structure of Zimbabwean politics began to change. Few Western governments made any effort to help this fledgling movement that was almost entirely made up of the poor and disadvantaged. A British NGO made a grant to the MDC of $100 000 and the British government nearly fell over themselves trying to distance themselves from the grant. But by 2002 it was becoming obvious to everyone that the MDC was here to stay and that they were, almost single-handedly, dismantling the one-party State system at the cost of hundreds of their supporters and many of their leaders. In a belated attempt to help, Western States imposed targeted sanctions on some 200 individuals and companies with a demand that the Zanu PF regime adopts reforms that would in fact commit them to political suicide in the struggle with the MDC.

That was never going to happen, but instead of helping the MDC with the struggle and in its campaigns during regular elections on an uneven playing field, they maintained their ”principled stand” that they were not giving support to any opposition party.

Just as the Rhodesians had made a mockery of UN sanctions, the sanctions imposed on the Zanu PF regime were more of a nuisance than a real deterrent to delinquent behaviour. Instead, the Mugabe regime intensified its efforts to crush opposition and the casualties of the internal political struggle mounted. To be frank, anyone understanding the power play here and the mismatch of forces in the field would have known that change could only come when the regime itself decided that this was essential to its own survival. That came in November 2017 and the people poured out onto the streets in mass celebration following Mugabe’s ouster in a military coup.

But the change was in no way due to the sanctions programme now 15 years old — three years longer than the UN programme. The government, newly elected and recognised, lost no time in outlining that they knew exactly what was needed to regain entry to global markets and access to the clubs that control world trade, only to discover that the internal forces that had helped with the change in 2017, were now opposed to any real changes in the way the country was being run.

In one respect, I have to say that the current government’s view that sanctions are damaging is not ill founded. They may be targeted as we hear repeatedly, but those of us who are in business know all too well the cost. While the countries of the Far East have been able to trade freely with the rest of the world and borrow massive sums of money from international markets at very low interest rates, Zimbabweans have had to constantly battle with what is seen as country risk which as any analysis will tell you is partly influenced by the financial restrictions the major countries in the West use against those with whom they have disagreement.

Our banks are, in the majority, denied normal relationships with international banks and any money transfer of over US$5 000 is monitored by the US authorities. The recent unilateral imposition of a fine on our largest bank of US$300 million is just one more example of this bullying activity.

We cannot hope to compete or to grow our economy until such constraints are removed and the main casualty of this process is not those targeted, but the poor and the marginalised. The very people who have fought a brave and tough campaign to end the one-party State and bring us back to democracy under a half decent Constitution. If he had lived to this day, MDC founder Morgan Tsvangirai would have joined forces with those who have argued for a change in strategy by the West. Have sanctions changed Cuba one iota? No! Former US President Barack Obama was right by opening up Cuba to trade and tourism, change would inevitably come to Cubans — who in the meantime are able to make a better living.

Sanctions are a blunt instrument that seldom produces change in the countries so targeted. One thing history tells us is that opening up societies and raising living standards and building up the middle class is a better way.

 Eddie Cross is a local economist and writes here in his personal capacity