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Text of letter to Gono: A real hero does more than remove zeroes
Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA)
August 21, 2006

WOZA does not believe that this 'sunrise' of yours will bring a better tomorrow - only more suffering for the people who have always carried the burden of government's incompetence.

It is not the ordinary people of Zimbabwe who are the criminals and economic saboteurs but the government, RBZ and all its cronies!

Operation Sunrise is further testimony of a government at war with its own people. Our uniformed forces should not be 'used' and 'abused' to bring about economic revival. But Operation Sunrise is not about economic revival. It is just another desperate measure by a government desperate trying to control us - people already on our knees weighed down by problems, trying to survive.

Already we are faced with daily harassment by children dressed up to commit evil that many adults are too embarrassed to carry out. As we travel around we are treated like criminals, illegally searched and intimidated. Many have been robbed of our life savings as we tried to reach banks to change it into new currency. Some women were even stripped naked by youth militia trying to 'earn' the 40 million promised to them. Our rural members are afraid to travel to banks to deposit their money, as they will have their money stolen at roadblocks by your thugs.

You did not even bother to respect us enough to do education and groundwork before launching this operation. As a result we are seeing your thugs making up the rules as they go and abusing power. It seems you wanted chaos and it is what you achieved. Whilst you are harassing us the real criminals are going free with their trillions.

Did you think? Having larger notes will only make life a little easier for a short time - we are already seeing prices going up and the zeroes coming back.

You have stolen from us at roadblocks and now we are seeing free-for-all prices increases. For how much longer must we pay the price for your bad to non-existent economic policies?

The 21-day deadline is another way of cheating us. You have not given enough time to allow us to understand the new money or for enough of it to be in circulation. Shops are already refusing to accept old currency and yet they are giving it to us in change. Mozambique is used as an example of a country that successfully dropped its zeroes but it gave its citizens six months to adjust and its economy was already growing - not crashing like ours.

You and the other leaders of this government have shown yet again that you don't have any constructive ideas to rebuild our economy - you are, as usual, destroying and stealing what little we have sweated blood to make.

WOZA says enough is enough. We want our dignity to be restored. WE WANT REAL MONEY. We don't want to be bankrupted by the printing of paper that has no real value. What kind of sovereignty is this when we do not have our own currency?

We also want GENUINE solutions to our economic problems implemented with consultation. Slashing zeroes is a sign of terrified people who don't know how to cope with the inflation you call the 'venomous monster'. To us there is only one venomous monster and that is the ruling party who rule by force and are corrupt. THERE CAN BE NO ECONOMIC SOLUTION WITHOUT A NEW POLITICAL DISPENSATION. It takes more than a banker to provide real solutions - it takes a real hero - and the only heroes we see are those standing shoulder to shoulder with us, holding you, and the masters you serve, accountable. You can detain us but you cannot detain the truth! Warova mukadzi warova dombo - Strike a woman and you strike a rock - Uthinte umfazi uthinte imbokodo

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