THOUSANDS of food insecure families in Harare and other cities and towns yesterday flocked to their rural homes after failing to stock up enough food supplies to last them until the end of the 21-day national lockdown which came into effect last night.
Fears, however, abound that the urban-rural migration could
further spread COVID-19 to the country’s marginalised communities.
Most major bus terminuses in Harare, Bulawayo, Mutare and
Masvingo were packed with rural-bound travellers rushing to beat the midnight
deadline of the lockdown announced by President Emmerson Mnangagwa on Friday.
Several people who spoke to NewsDay said they had no
choice, but to spend the three-week shutdown in their rural areas, where there
were better chances of getting food and water supplies while the possibility of
contracting the deadly disease is minimal because of the low concentration of
people.
So far, Zimbabwe has had seven confirmed cases in Harare
and Victoria and one death.
“It is not that easy to migrate to Chiredzi. I live in a
one-roomed house with my three children and to keep social distance might not
be easy, hence I am opting for my village,” said Chenai Moyo of Mbare hostels
as she waited for her Chiredzi-bound bus.
Another traveller, Joseph Mhembere, said:“My company has
closed and I am not sure if we are going to receive this month’s salary. I
decided to move to my rural home in Gokwe so that my children won’t suffer from
hunger. I cannot survive this lockdown period without any financial help.”
A visit to Entumbane and Renkini bus terminuses in Bulawayo
showed that many people were boarding rural-bound buses despite bus crews
having taken advantage of the high demand to hike fares.
Takesure Chitauro, a driver at Inter Africa buses, said
they had increased the number of buses that ply most rural routes to cater for
the swelling number of passengers.
“Today, we had seven buses going to Chiredzi and they were
all full. People are fleeing the city saying there is coronavirus and we are
happy today that we have managed to capitalise on our profits,” he said.
At Sakubva in Mutare, transport operators recorded brisk
business as people jostled to get transport to their respective rural homes.
Operators who spoke to NewsDay said people were still
waiting for transport to Nyanga, Chipinge, Chimanimani and Nyanyadzi by late
evening yesterday.
Several bus operators who increased bus fares were charging
between US$10 and US$15 or $300 to Chiredzi up from $240.
Harare-Kwekwe operators pegged fares at US$10, up from
ZWL$60.
Zimbabwe Nurses Association president Enock Dongo said
migrating to rural posed a fresh challenge.
“It is unfortunate that people decided to migrate to rural
areas. It will be a disaster countrywide. We have been urging the government to
equip all hospitals with the protective measure for coronavirus, but it did not
listen.
People in rural areas do not have information on how to
protect themselves from infected persons. You cannot greet your old parents
with an elbow, they do not understand that,” he said.
“The whole logic of 21 days lockdown means that coronavirus
symptoms develop after 14 days and if you have it, it will develop within the
21 days while in lockdown. The tracking of contacts will be easy, but now if
you go to rural areas with it, but not knowing your status, you can infect the
whole village and it will be a big disaster since the government does not have
capacity at the moment.”
Community Working Group on Health executive director Itai
Rusike said testing for COVID-19 should be stepped up so that infected people
take measures to avoid infecting others, or to get the care they need and to
help authorities take action to slow it.
“Indeed, official statistics shows that we only have seven
COVID-19 confirmed cases and one death for a population of about 15 million.
The real numbers may be higher than this if we increase and widen our testing
capacity, hence some people may be moving around spreading the disease unknowingly
and, unfortunately, the people in the rural areas can become collateral damage
due to the mass movement of people to their rural homes in the last few days in
an effort to beat the total lockdown that is likely to have a bigger impact on
those in urban areas compared to their rural counterparts.”
MDC secretary for labour Gideon Shoko said government
should have consulted workers before enforcing the lockdown to avert
starvation.
“While the lockdown decision is welcome, the challenge now
to the working class both formal and informal, is … with their meagre wages and
salaries, workers must buy adequate food rations, pay their rentals, rates,
water, funeral insurances etc, but alas this is impossible,” he said.
“So far, nothing tangible has been put in place to have
safety nets for the poor workers. This means that they are going to be on
lockdown with nothing to support their families.
“Certainly, if this was a responsible government elected
and answerable to the masses, it would have cared to consult stakeholders at
the Tripartite Negotiating Forum on how the needs of the workforce would be
taken care of during these trying times.”
Ibhetshu lika Zulu party secretary-general Mbuso Fuzwayo
said: “Lockdown is good, but there was no adequate planning. Nothing is said
about those vulnerable on the streets. With our failing economy, we need days
to prepare for the lockdown. (There is) little information to those in the
periphery and those who survive on food handouts from food agencies. Nothing
has been out in place on how they will access their allocation.”
However, on Saturday, government said distribution of food
aid would continue during the lockdown.
“The distribution of food aid will continue. However,
distribution points will be increased in order to minimise large gatherings,”
Information minister Monica Mutsvangwa said after an inter-ministerial
taskforce on COVID-19.
“At the moment, grain and monetary payments are being made
to 760 000 households throughout the country.”
Contacted for comment, Health minister Obadiah Moyo asked
the NewsDay to forward questions to the ministry’s public relations department.
Health ministry permanent secretary Agnes Mahomva was not reachable on her
mobile phone.
In a statement, World Health Organisation director-general
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus yesterday said lockdowns on their own would not
extinguish the epidemics, but just reduce pressure on health systems.
“Asking people to stay at home and shutting down population
movement is buying time and reducing the pressure on health systems, but on
their own, these measures will not extinguish the epidemics. The point of these
actions is to enable the more precise and targeted measures that are needed to
stop transmission and save lives,” he said.
“We call on all countries that have introduced so-called
‘lockdown’ measures to use this time to attack the virus. You have created a
second window of opportunity.” Newsday
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