Alex Tawanda Magaisa, a law lecturer in the United Kingdom has said that the authorisation of payment of passport fees and fuel in foreign currency is a blow to the de-dollarisation drive.
The country scrapped the multicurrency system in June 2019 and reintroduced the Zimbabwe dollar through Statutory Instrument (SI) 142 of 2019.
But only recently, the government gave fuel dealers the greenlight to sell the commodity in foreign currency and also gazetted an SI that authorised the use of foreign currency to pay for passport fees.
Commenting on the development, Magaisa said:
This is yet another step in the incremental decline of the Zimbabwe dollar as its zone of exclusivity is eroded. After fuel and passports, there will be more exemptions from using the Zimbabwe dollar, especially in transactions that involve the government. This is primarily because the government is in desperate need for foreign currency.
He adds that the government has set a precedence that would trigger and or reinforce the belief that even the government does not have confidence in its own currency.
Magaisa speaks when some economists are urging the government to ditch its de-dollarisation agenda to stabilise the economy which is now hyperinflationary.
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