Zanu PF youths have declared war on illegal traders and
ruling party bigwigs suspected of being behind the country’s thriving foreign
currency black market.
Their warning comes as bond notes continue to crash
precipitously against the United States dollar — causing mayhem in mainstream
business and resulting in panicking shoppers rushing to hoard basic goods.
Zanu PF youth league secretary Pupurai Togarepi yesterday
said that illegal money changers and their “bosses” had a week to leave the
streets or face the consequences.
“While patience is a virtue, this should never be
misconstrued for docility.
“We have watched in horror and dismay so-called money
changers holding this nation to ransom and we cannot continue to let these
greedy and corrupt individuals continue to bleed this great nation which is on
an economic rebound and a new political trajectory under the able leadership of
President ED Mnangagwa just to line their pockets.
“We will not hesitate to take the money and hand it over to
the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in a transparent and accountable way,” Togarepi
warned.
This comes as the country is gripped by a critical shortage
of foreign currency which has impacted the economy very negatively.
Togarepi, who is also the Zanu PF chief whip in Parliament,
also said they would “smoke out” party bigwigs whom they accused of fuelling
the illegal currency trading.
“Let those behind these crooks who are hoarding our monies
know that we have the means to smoke them out and we will only give them seven days
to shape up or ship out.
“The youth league, as the vanguard of the country, will not
tolerate this nonsense any further and very soon we will descend on the robbers
who are masquerading as money changers.
“This stern warning also applies to foreigners who have
hijacked our retail sector ... we are not against investment but we abhor this
practice by foreigners of mopping up forex and externalising it to their home
countries,” the Gutu South MP said.
Zimbabwe is in the grip of a mega economic crisis which has
led to company closures, severe job cuts and price increases on the back of
foreign currency shortages.
The government’s recent attempts to revive the economy have
suffered setbacks as weary Zimbabweans accuse authorities of piling more taxes
on them instead of assisting them.
On Monday, Finance minister Mthuli Ncube introduced a raft
of measures aimed at breathing life into the country’s sickly economy—
including a two cents per dollar transaction tax which has backfired
spectacularly after being rejected by angry Zimbabweans.
Militant labour unions have warned that they are preparing
to go on strike — to protest the tax.
Despite Ncube’s later revision of his measures, the
situation has blown into a full-scale crisis, as businesses have hiked goods
prices, raising fears that inflation will spiral out of control.
“We have the means. We are the ruling party and we have the
law on our side.
“We say it is unacceptable that a foreigner or anyone for
that matter lives with millions of US dollars under their mattresses. At the
lapse of the seven days we are going to name and shame the thieves posing as
investors.
“We will strip them bare and ask relevant authorities to
deport them from Zimbabwe. Our people yearn for tangibles and we, as the future
of this country, will not allow a few miscreants to stop this beautiful dream
whose time has come,” Togarepi thundered further.
“We are also aware that some saboteurs are hell bent on
causing artificial shortages of commodities like cement for speculative
purposes.
“This will only end badly for them because we as the youth
league will ask government to revoke their licences.
“We have the capacity and we will make sure the good of the
people is respected.
“This also applies to kombis. We have the names of
foreigners who are in the transport business and we know that they are also
behind money changers,” he said further Daily News
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