Zimbabwe: A giant facing economic collapse? - BBC HARDtalk, On the Road (2019)

[Music] [Music] positions are dying people I've gained the current situation in the healthcare system unison bubblies quality Zimbabwe was for so many years defined by Robert Mugabe and the struggle for independence now he's gone but this country has yet to emerge from his shadow do you trust President Mun and a guar to make things there's no jobs there's no money there's no foodstuffs millions of Zimbabweans go to bed hungry dependent on handouts for survival this country is on the brink of catastrophe who or what will save it [Music] [Music] more than half a million people live in EM Barry a sprawling slum on the outskirts of Harare this is where Zimbabweans come to escape crushing rural poverty many find themselves in a different sort of trap in the last month it has been difficult to obtain cash 27 year old richard fanny is desperate to find a way out is it almost impossible to find a full-time proper job if net to never find any next ever nifty to never no jobs and soaring inflation it's a recipe for wholesale desperation aid agencies reckon half of all Zimbabweans now rely on assistance for survival do you trust President Minh and Jaguar to make things better so why do you say he's making things worse every day and do you have children yeah and they're not going to school I can't afford em you're not even going to school when Managua replaced Mugabe people hope that maybe things would get better really yeah you seriously think things were better under President Mugabe [Music] Zimbabwe's infrastructure is crumbling two million people in Harare have been without piped water for months the fear is isolated cases of cholera and typhoid could become an epidemic and the country is in the grip of a power crisis drought has cut hydroelectricity supplies this coal-fired power station on the road to and Barrie has run out of spare parts at sunset the mood shifts quickly unembarrassed streets the entire neighborhood is plunged into darkness pierced only by fires oil lamps and the lucky few with generators richard is now taking me to a friend's house it's about seven o'clock in the evening and I can tell you that walking through ambani in the dark well it's a pretty weird experience richard guides me down dark alleys and into a block originally built for single male laborers but now teaming with families crammed into tiny space thank you Yvonne mugambi and nine members of her family spanning three generations live in this one room Yvonne in the dark at night when there's no power there's no lights to you and the kids feel safe here no they don't feel safe because some of the people are being robbed at night there are ticks all over this community so we don't feel safe if there is no electricity when Zimbabwe's military pushed robert mugabe out of power two years ago there was hope of an end to the era of misrule and corruption incoming president Emerson Managua promised economic reform modernization and a rise to middle income status by 2030 by early this year hope had morphed into anger and despair when the government lifted fuel subsidies protesters took to the streets a dozen people were killed in a brutal crackdown It was as if Mugabe had never gone away arguably things are now worse amid a currency crisis fuel imports have been cut those who need petrol face a wearying ordeal just tell me how long you waited to get to the head of the queue today well I got into the kid half 7:00 this morning three hours let's see ah that is a lot of your workday been taken up with sitting in a car doing nothing that's my morning gun it makes business very difficult makes the whole of your life very difficult but it is a way of life yet the later Mugabe years saw the Zimbabwean currency collapse and hyperinflation set in the u.s. dollar became the de facto currency now there's an effort to reintroduce the Zimbabwean dollar but only in limited amounts to thwart the black marketeers just taking a walk through central Harare and I've just spotted a large crowd of people outside what I think is a bank so let's go find out what's happening show me the new Zimbabwe dollars so there's a new $2 bill and they've just printed these for the first time and how many dollars were you allowed to take out today it will last for how many days if $100 and a dress for one day one day yes and then it's finished are you confident that the government and president Managua are stabilizing the economy because it has been a mess for a very long time yes I'm confident you are because many people here are not why are you so calm very very confident why because enough is enough you've suffered enough yes but I'm confident we are everything is going to be stabilized it seems like Zimbabweans they have this ability to survive even in the most difficult situation strong people that's why we are called to sum up things we are very strong people there is a veneer of normality in Harare but scratch the surface and desperation is exposed this should be one of Herrera's busiest hospitals but the chronically sick are being sent home almost all the doctors are refusing to work they don't call it a strike they say they've been incapacitated by salaries that have been dramatically devalued ma Simba and Oro is 25 a proud and newly qualified doctor so is Tapia women gofer after all the hard work the training they've both been fired for refusing to work you're a trained doctor you should be in the hospital but you're not you're not at work why we as doctors are incapacitated to report for duty that is to say we cannot afford to report for duty each and every day we can't afford transport why because they the money that we are getting from the government is not enough for us to come to work every day to be brutal about it is this all about money you want more money than the government is prepared to offer you absolutely this is about money so there is a gap and the salaries that we are getting from the government are completely detached from the reality and from the situation on the ground in real terms that is in US dollar terms your last salary was basically about $4 a day yes basically if you had to deduct it's basically around $4 to $5 per day and is that possible for you and your family to live on I think if you had to if you had to reduce or to use it for transport food accommodation that's something which is Phe pouchy salary and you can't you can't even have a decent living many Zimbabweans might say to you look guys life is tough for everybody in Zimbabwe but you have special skills you are a doctor you are your whole career is about caring for people how can you because of money walk out of your hospital okay if I may appeal to your conscience and to the conscience of the people of Zimbabwe would think like that I I have some special skills that I am willing to use I'm actually willing to be at work but the situation is that I cannot afford to be at work how hard is it for you as a doctor to know that there are very sick patients in that building behind you but you feel you cannot go in and treat them how hard is that it's very hard and it's very heartbreaking as doctors we actually if our patients it had and this what we are doing we actually advocating for the patients what is happening to overwatch people opening to the sick people in Zimbabwe is that patients are dying people are dying and and and I mean avoidable deaths because of the current situation in the odd case system in in Zimbabwe is collapsed there is noyoke a system to talk about but the government would say that is on your conscience because you are the doctors who are refusing to work yes but it's not on our conscience because we cannot afford to come to again I cannot use my conscience to pay for my bills I cannot use my conscience to pay for transport I am just an ordinary employee like any other employee and I need to be capacitated for me to do my job do you feel the same how do you cope yourself with your own conscience given that there are so many sick people who are suffering as a result of this I I don't draw any pleasure from this but I believe this is the silent genocide which is going on people are dying because they can't I get the old care services they deserve to get silent genocide that is a very very strong phrase a strong idea do you really mean that you mean the government is deliberately jeopardizing the people let me explain now it is the government's responsibility to make sure affordable and quality health care is provided to its citizens I must be thinking of French house food accommodation basic basic basic needs if I might attend enterprise I should be a war focused motivated worker when attending to a patient would you love to paginate to to a demotivated doctor we stink of other things worse is attending to your health he needs I just thought since independence Zimbabwe's Parliament has been dominated by zanu-pf Mugabe's party Manan gag was party a ruthless political machine the party blames continued international sanctions for the country's policy misrule and mismanagement are never acknowledged and as the president attended Parliament for the annual budget presentation a crowd of loyalists was rounded up to put on a show [Applause] [Music] [Music] after Mugabe the promise was changed instead Zimbabwe days are getting more of the same Minister Mangal I saw in Louisville welcome to hard talk thank you thank you for having me and welcome to Zimbabwe thank you very much let me begin this interview by quoting some words from President Ma angora at the time of his inauguration he said we are going to grow modernize and mechanize our economy we will transform our people into middle-income citizens the reality is very very different what's gone wrong thank you for that they are always silent features in certain statements in that he never said it will be easy he did not at any point underestimate the magnitude of the work that lies ahead so we are quite confident that the journey we have traveled so far and the genu will still add to travel it's quite promising so yes well motion people simply don't have work they do not have an income I went to embarrass Esther day a vast sprawling suburb on the edge of this city her alley I spoke to dozens of young people none of them had a job employment remains a challenge and I'm glad just to say that we have even put very specific incentives targeting at employment creation for young people in the coming years and but you've had two years already what happened in those two years well there has to be a reforms in place which we have done which we have put in place I wanted to just get back to the direction that we have taken we thought in our transitional stabilization program too stabilize the macroeconomic environment and particularly targeting budget deficit and a current account deficit these two in my view we've done very well it's still work in progress and once these have been addressed we believe that we'll have the necessary impetus to then grow the economy and create the jobs that we saw stability you say stability well let's look at the perhaps most obvious sign of instability currency crisis your Finance Minister has just introduced new Zimbabwean dollar bills $2 and $5 I've seen the vast queues outside banks because people are only allowed to withdraw $100 a week in most banks there is still a raging black market in currency exchange there are speculators just a few yards from this hotel it's still exploiting people because your currency crisis is not resolved I will agree with you that we still have a challenge in the currency a situation particularly on the speculative side what has happened is that over the years Zimbabwe has had almost the largest penetration in terms of digital currency and this involved inclusion of quite a number of people I think were close to 85% Financial Inclusion due to our mobile money transfer system but because of the fragility of our currency people have tended now to want to use more of the hard currency hence the pressure which we are seeing in the banks and this is creating loopholes and opportunities for arbitration with respect your government isn't closing those loopholes those opportunities in fact many Zimbabweans believe that people in power are actually collaborating with the money changes and the speculators many people in this city and across your country are disillusioned with president Mun and GOG hua and his record and as we speak your inflation rate you won't even publish the figures anymore but your inflation rate is believed to be somewhere over 300% you've lost control okay inflation why we decided that publishing is misleading in Hawaii it's cause we have transitioned last year this time around we had a parity in terms of the exchange rate and when we liberalized our exchange rate it gives a false impression when you look at our prices last year in US dollar terms and you compare the prices this time around in US dollar terms you might find that the price is in US dollar terms of actually going down but because of the disparities in exchange rate then we have these numerous distortions Minister I have are you aware that there are many people in your city who are now so impoverished who see the price rises cannot afford food they are reduced them and their families to living on one meal a day are you aware of that I will admit that this has created pressure particularly on the purchasing power the wages have not aligned to the exchange rate movements and that has been the major challenge which we are gradually addressing but I'm asking you as a human being as a Weiand do you go to places like M Barrie to be this and are you aware that their children are going hungry as we speak well there tends to be also issues of exaggerating certain issues we think you think that's an exaggeration no no I admit that there is a challenge when it comes to food security which is why we have even put a flash appeal to the United Nations and all cooperating partners when we talk of people going hungry we are literally talking about food on the table and food on the table there is a direct impact coming from the drought that we have experienced and this has stretched if I may say government social protection expenditure because we have had to import close to 70% of our grain just to make sure that this adequate crane in the country so we are there to focus more on addressing food security issue I spoke to young doctors yesterday newly trained very proud of their qualification as a Zimbabwean doctor they say they cannot they will not go to work in the hospitals because they can't afford to they have to put it their way being incapacitated by the fact that the real value of their wages as doctors represents little more than three US dollars a day some of them are selling their possessions simply to survive you and your government again must bear responsibility for the collapse of your health care system but what I can say is from the first day we have opened our doors for negotiations we still engage our doctors this is a process that we don't believe we can resolve within a short space of time and I just want to give you a different perspective over the last year we undertook reforms through our austerity measures on our own I'll give you examples of countries that you have gone through reforms and the kind of assistance that they but we did that on our own and obviously we do appreciate that our people have had to pay the price look at countries like Greece they got more than hundred and sixty billion support Egypt from this bring rice they've got more than 12 billion support recently we had from there so we had two times when they all say and but but one of the reasons why Zimbabwe is not getting international support is because there's no faith in the competence and the honesty of your government just to take a few examples power plants are lying idle right now partly because parts which were ordered from South Africa years ago and paid for have never been delivered and no one knows where that money has gone look at your national airline you used to be commerce and trade minister surely you are concerned that the national airline isn't allowed to fly because IATA the International Organization says that it is not satisfied your airline has the maintenance safety record which would allow it to mandate it to fly and this is a competence issue you will realize that this is a government that has really struggled over the past two decades and over time what you are talking about a real expenditure issues corruption issues on food are aside this is a real challenge and we are putting efforts to make sure that it is addressed what you are talking about is something that was unveiled in our internal audit systems and drastic measures have been taken on that but on physical expenditure issues we have had to contend with the effects of isolation with the effects of sanctions you rather tactfully put in there a reference to sanctions as though some of this could be blamed upon the international community for their very limited targeted sanctions which the US and the EU have put on Zimbabwe going back many years the truth surely is that again scapegoating sanctions will not work because in the words of the US ambassador to this country just the other day he said it is unacceptable to talk about sanctions as a scapegoat when Zimbabwe's real problem is the fundamental betrayal of public trust there are people getting rich many in Zimbabwe's political elite as the economy continues to deteriorate around them and it is the Zimbabwean people who are suffering that's from the US ambassador I wouldn't expect him to say anything different would you I mean is them imposing the sanctions if they are so ineffective but justifies the existence because they're targeting individuals who are deemed to be thoroughly corrupt I am former minister of industry and commerce the biggest company we ever had in this country was this costume it's still under sanctions today one of the biggest companies that were formed to spearhead industrialization ITC was under sanctions how targeted are these sanctions when you look at banks that have been penalized just for facilitating transactions business transactions you think these are targeted this is just mad because it's targeted at collapse in the economy the generation that lived through the Mugabe era saw their hopes crushed long ago Zimbabwe's tragedy is that a new generation is being robbed at a decent future

Channel: BBC HARDtalk

Views: 684,737

Rating: 4.6220407 out of 5

Keywords: BBC Hardtalk, Stephen Sackur, Zeinab Badawi, politics, interview BBC, Zimbabwe, Hardtalk on the road, Africa, African economy, Zimbabwe economy, Robert Mugabe, Mugabe zimbabwe

Id: whDZUhEgDwo

Length: 24min 26sec (1466 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 23 2020