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Cash situation urgent
Restoration of Human Rights (ROHR)
October 06, 2008

On Thursday 25 September 2008, Restoration Of Human Rights Zimbabwe (ROHR Zimbabwe) filed an urgent court application to the high court for an order to scrap, or else review, the prohibitive cash withdrawal limit that was by then pegged at $1000. On the same day The Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, Gideon Gono pre-emptively increased his withdrawal limits per day to 20,000, a move that we feel was meant to make the case irrelevant. We instructed our lawyers not to withdraw the application, since we felt that the review was not adequate, cosmetic and unilaterally imposed without prior consultation with the people directly affected. Besides, a week has passed since the review and the queues have not disappeared. On the contrary they have increased.

On 3 October, The Herald newspaper under the headline "CASH CASE NOT URGENT", quote Justice Joseph Musakwa as saying the cash case in which ROHR Zimbabwe members were suing the Central bank Governor and the Finance Minister is not urgent and should join the long civil case queue for it to be heard. In other words we are supposed to join another queue to stop the cash queues!

Gideon Gono through his unilateral adhoc policies is presiding over the continued suffering and deterioration of living standards of hundreds of thousands of people in Zimbabwe. People's constitutional rights and the Universal declaration of human rights such as the people's rights to food, freedom of movement, access to health, and right to life are in the process curtailed due to the inaccessibility of their hard earned cash.

The Organisation pooled together four individuals, who we are sponsoring, to represent all Zimbabwean suffering due to cash problems. The individuals are Rodgers Chigwededza, Tinashe Gotora, Jackson Mabota, and Precious Mateyeni and are all members of ROHR Zimbabwe.

Jackson Mabota's wife is pregnant and he is the only bread winner. His salary is deposited in the bank and is struggling to get his money from the bank so he can sustain his family needs. Mrs Mateyeni has two school going children who have been missing classes because of the cash crisis caused by Gono's policies.

Fellow Zimbabweans, We believe that these people's stories are no different from what most of us are going through. Actually the reality is even worse for a majority of Zimbabweans including nurses, police, security guards and students. Over the week, we have seen an increase in the winding cash queues, which to an observer look resemble political rallies. The elderly, children and women are forced sleep at banks, spend more than 8 hours in the blistering sun and then in the biting cold, day and night, for cash they are not guaranteed to get. There is reasonable risk of the spread of diseases and the situation is unpredictable especially now that a cholera epidemic is wrecking havoc. Denying people access to their hard earned cash is unacceptable.

Furthermore, On Friday 3rd of October, the reserve bank governor suspended the RTGS system 'with immediate until further notice', a move that is likely to increase demand for cash as parents would have to be forced to use cash to pay school fees, medical bills and many transactions that could be completed by the RTGS system of transferring money. Given the circumstances, we feel it is unfair to inconvenience the majority of the populace by enforcing policies that are meant to deal with a fraction of the so-called elites and dealers who are abusing the system.

ROHR Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans at large cannot afford to let the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor to continue unabated with such dangerous and ill informed "intervention measures" as long as they stand in the way of the people's rights. We will pursue the matter with whatever means is necessary until we see a change of behaviour on the part of the Reserve bank.

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