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Economic hardships worsen in rural areas
Walter Marwizi , The Standard (Zimbabwe)
August 16, 2008

http://www.thezimbabwestandard.com/local/18729-economic-hardships-worsen-in-rural-areas.html

"I never thought I could do it. I walked the entire 70km on an empty stomach."

This is how Johannes Munyikwa summed up his long walk on the bumpy gravel road from Mpandawana growth point to Chin'ai township in Gutu East.

Munyikwa, who had spent two months without getting his salary got stranded at the growth point last month when he found that his savings had been wiped out by bank charges. He could not raise the bus fare to go back to his school.

"I only managed to withdraw $80 billion ($8 revalued), the conductor demanded $500 billion ($50 revalued) from me," he said.

A distressed Munyikwa, realising he could not do anything about it, teamed up with other teachers and walked for two days back to their stations.

"It was an unpleasant experience. I had blisters all over my feet," he said.

"In an independent Zimbabwe, I did not anticipate that a professional like myself would be reduced to a long distance footer," he said, shaking his head.

Munyikwa still walks with a limp but nobody at his school seems to notice.

His story is just but one of the many that are being told by villagers in the province where living standards are fast deteriorating due to the economic hardships besetting the country.

Villagers fear their lives now bear striking resemblance to that of pre-historic men who relied on stone tools for survival.

Apart from walking long distances, the villagers are starting to rely once again on the pestle and mortar and the grinding stone, among other traditional instruments that had been abandoned after Independence ushered in a new era of diesel and electric-powered grinding mills.

"Everybody seems to be going back to the past," said a 70-year-old Taurai Manomano, who is making money selling pestle and mortar and grinding stones.

"I know of course many young people find it hard to use this thing, but surely if you don't use them, you will starve," Manomano said.

Manomano's skills, perfected in the 60s, have suddenly become useful after the local grinding mill at Mushwayi business centre was rendered useless by prolonged power cuts. Several other grinding mills in the area that used diesel were shut down a long time ago when the fuel crisis surfaced.

Faced with shortages of commodities and price controls, general dealers closed shop, leaving many rural business centres resembling ghost towns. This meant that villagers had nowhere to buy goods needed for daily use.

But what worries villagers most are the acute food shortages that have hit hard vulnerable people, mainly the old men and women and child-headed families.

Just four months ago these people did not have any reason to worry as the international aid agency, CARE operated in the area, providing them with enough groceries for their upkeep.

But CARE, like the other agencies stopped operations in June after government banned their relief programmes in the run up the Presidential election run off. Ironically, this ban which affected over 110 000 people, was announced as President Mugabe attended the UN World Food Security conference in Rome.

The move left many threatened with starvation. Some of these people are surviving on wild fruits.

Concerned villagers bemoan the fact that government has prevented relief agencies from helping them.

They now suspect that for political reasons, government wants to fill the void by the introduction of Basic Commodity Supply Side Intervention (Bacossi).

But they say the programme is not inclusive and doubt if it can be relied upon as they did with CARE.

"They (Bacossi officials) only came once last month, and we never saw them again. They left out many villages and there is no reason for us to think they are coming back again," said Musomari Mushangwe.

Villagers have had to struggle to raise the $100 billion needed to buy the Bacossi package that includes cooking oil, sanitary pads, bath and laundry soap, 2kg rice, flour, candles, toothpaste and Vaseline.

"People think the $100 billion needed is easy to get. Where does one get such kind of money here?" one old woman asked.

These days whenever there is a funeral or memorial service, villagers see a chance to get a proper meal. Before they leave, some scramble for left-overs.

"Judging by the way things are now, we shudder to think how our lives will be like at the end of the year. We can only hope these talks between MDC and Zanu PF can succeed," said Mushangwe.

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