Peta Thornycroft
Ottawa Citizen , Oct. 19, 2008
HARARE - Aid agencies have accused President Robert Mugabe of cutting their lifeline to millions of starving Zimbabweans after he imposed sweeping bank restrictions that have made it impossible for them to finance their
operations.
In an attempt to stop speculators profiteering on the wide gulf between the official and black market exchange rates, the Zimbabwean reserve bank has
cancelled the inter-bank money transfer system used by businesses and aid
agencies to move money around.
With daily cash withdrawals limited to $50,000 Zimbabwean dollars a day --
worth only about $2.50 Cdn. -- it has become impossible for relief workers
to make the payments necessary to buy and distribute food or pay staff
wages.
The banking restriction came despite a warning last week by the United
Nations that nearly one third of Zimbabweans under five were malnourished, and that nearly half the population would depend on emergency food aid by
next year.
"We cannot get money from the banks to pay people to distribute the food, it
is as simple as that," said the operations manager of one of the top three
distributing agencies, which has been working in Zimbabwe for the past 16
years. "We can't pay our staff hotel bills, or buy food for our field workers, or even advertise for people we need to hire to distribute food.
"We have enough food in the warehouse to ensure no one starves, and we have
enough money in the bank to finance our operations, but the reserve bank
will not give us access to it."
The chief executive of one of the largest donor organizations in Zimbabwe
said: "We don't want to believe that this is deliberate."
The aid agencies spoke out as power-sharing talks between Mr. Mugabe's
ruling Zanu-PF party and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, led
by Morgan Tsvangirai, appeared to be on the verge of collapse. Mr. Tsvangirai is refusing to give way to Mr. Mugabe's insistence that Zanu-PF should remain in control of the home affairs ministry, which controls the security forces widely blamed for intimidating and killing MDC supporters.
Both sides have now asked the Southern African Development Community to
intervene in the talks mediated by former South African president Thabo
Mbeki, and will meet in Swaziland tomorrow.
Mr. Mugabe banned all non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from working in
rural areas after he lost the first round of the presidential elections to Mr. Tsvangirai. He claimed NGOs had been giving food to MDC supporters, and
only allowed them to resume work in August.
The Zimbabwean central bank cancelled inter-bank transfers on the orders of
its governor, Gideon Gono, who has been accused of diverting public money to
support Zanu-PF and of fuelling inflation by printing bank notes.
James Morton
1100 - 5255 Yonge Street
Toronto, Ontario
M2N 6P4
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