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Aid
agencies fear doomsday scenario in Zim
Associated
Press
June 13, 2007
http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?from=rss_SADC&set_id=1&click_id=84&art_id=nw20070613223923468C262269
Harare - If the worst
happens, private consultants in Zimbabwe say, aid groups should
brace for shops and businesses to close and for Zimbabwe to declare
a state of emergency.
Households were already
stockpiling durable foods in anticipation of worsening shortages
of most basic goods, said a report compiled for the heads of charities
and aid organisations. Aid agency officials said the report was
compiled to raise awareness among international organisations, donors
and their staffers in Zimbabwe of growing concern among economic
commentators and in diplomatic circles.
The report, scheduled
for circulation on Wednesday by the Heads of Agencies Contact Group
to about 40 foreign aid groups and non- government organisations,
said questions remained over the role of police and the military
in its doomsday forecast. But it said a collapse could lead to a
sweeping state of emergency.
An ordinary police officer
routinely earned less than aid workers paid their housekeepers and
domestic staff, it said.
"The military are
not much better off... What are the likely scenarios for the uniformed
forces?" the report asked.
Police, troops and their
families have not been spared the impact of record official inflation
of 3 714 percent, the highest in the world. Last year, soldiers
were sent home from their barracks as the army ran out of food and
supplies and police have recently reported cases of absenteeism
in their ranks.
The report said in May
alone prices doubled across the board, with the month's official
inflation rising to just more than 100 percent in four weeks.
"Salaries and money
in the bank at the end of the month were worth less than half what
they were at the beginning," it said.
Shops were now doubling
the price of goods they bought a month ago and doubling them again
to allow them to buy replacement goods in a month's time.
If that trend continued,
"doubling the current inflation for each of the seven remaining
months of 2007 gives 512 000 percent, thus the economic collapse
is expected before the end of 2007", the consultants' report
said.
The report reminded foreigners
that price quotations for work ordered from local businesses until
recently were valid for between seven and
14 days. Prices were now being quoted as valid for one day or even
one hour.
It said shops and businesses
were closing at a faster rate than in past months and many firms
paid their staff weekly or every two weeks instead of monthly and
possibly would move daily.
Some employers also have
reportedly reverted to paying workers part of their income in food
and other items so as to bear the brunt of inflation themselves
and avoid increasing wages in cash.
The consultants said
in the event of six-figure inflation, the local currency would become
unusable, being replaced by barter and illicit trading only in hard
currencies.
"Shops and services
substantially cease to function" leading to increased unemployment,
already running at 80 percent outside subsistence activities, and
"concomitantly increased crime and possible civil disturbances."
The report said power
and water utilities were already near collapse, with long daily
outages being experienced across the country.
Since disruptions to
the agriculture-based economy began in 2000 with the often violent
seizures of thousands of white-owned commercial farms the economy
as a whole contracted by about 30 percent, it said.
"This compares
with a contraction of five percent for the great American depression,"
the consultants said. - Sapa-AP
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