Economist Gift Mugano Reviews ZANU PF Manifesto, Policies

Economist Gift Mugano says ZANU PF’s policies since Zimbabwe attained independence in 1980 have been a disaster.

After reviewing ZANU PF’s manifesto and policies over the past four decades, Mugano came to the conclusion that the ruling party’s achievements on the economic front equal zero. Mugano tweeted:

At independence, Zimbabwe adopted a strong economy whose currency was stronger than the USD, i.e., Z$1 = US$1.5.

The @ZANUPF_Official adopted an economy with massive protection which include exchange controls, trade protectionism and a planned economy. Import controls on capital goods, in particular, restricted growth.

Likewise, social spending on health and education resulted in an unsustainable budget deficit and rising debt.

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As a result, @ZANUPF_Official bowed to pressure from within its party, @czionline & the Bretton Woods Institutions to liberalise the economy under the Economic Structural Adjustment Programme (ESAP).

The main focus of ESAP was to liberalise trade, liberalise financial markets, exchange controls and the entire economy as well as cutting on social spending.

In implementing ESAP, ESAP coincided with the devastating 1992 drought. To make matters worse, the
@ZANUPF_Official didn’t logically sequenced the implementation of ESAP as it was hurriedly implemented in 2.5 years instead of 5 years, suffered from the absence of strong institutions and complementary policies such as industrial, trade and agricultural policies.

Resultantly, the results of ESAP were a DISASTER characterised by exchange rate volatility, soaring interest rates, rising imports reaching 20% on an annual basis, trade deficit rising to 20% of GDP, economic contraction and an emergence of an informal sector.

In 1997, the GOZ dished out unbudgeted packages to war veterans which resulted in the crash of the ZWL, i.e., the Black Friday of 14 November 1997.

To make matters worse, the GOZ participated in the DRC war which drained the country’s forex reserves. Up to now, the country has not realised any economic gain from the DRC war.

In early 2000, the GOZ implemented a chaotic land reform that disrupted robust agricultural value chains and rendered the country into a basket case.

The land reform could have been done in an orderly manner if the GOZ introduced a land tax on land holdings in the same way the PAYE is implemented.

This could have pushed the white commercial farmers to release the excess land whilst continuing farming on the remaining land.

To make matters worse, the @ZANUPF_Official unleashed violence & various forms of human rights abuse on the opposition.

The combination of human rights abuse, rising debt and land reform, saw the country being slapped with sanctions (see ZIDERA).

Between 1998 – 2008, the lost decade, the combination of international isolation, recklessness on the part of
@ZANUPF_Official through printing of money, rampant abuse of human rights in an unprecedented manner (ref short or long sleeve of the 2008), corruption, etc, the economy contracted by 52%, inflation picked to 89.7 sextillion % (89,700,000,000,000,000,000,000%).

As a result, the economy crashed. We lost our currency, pensions, savings and jobs.

Between 2009 – 2013, we were governed by a GNU and the economy performed exceptionally very averaging 10% per year.

Between 2013 – 2018 @ZANUPF_Official took charge of the economy and run incessant budget deficits & electronic printing of ZWL which saw the birth of the RTGS & rising domestic debt from 0 to US$9.4 billion.

The period 2018 to date saw @MthuliNcube putting the nail in the coffin. He assumed office when annual inflation in July 2018 was 4.3% & drove it to 837.5% in July 2020 (after suspending inflation estimation in July 2019) & 1200% as of 13 June 2023 (ref @steve_hanke).

He also drove the national debt from US$10 billion in 2018 to US$18.73 billion to date. Our budget short from $8.1 billion in 2018 to $4.5 trillion – a record of 56,000%. Health & education is dead. Again, we lost our pensions, savings & jobs.

Between 2018 -2023, the population in extreme poverty rose from 29% to 49% (see ZIMSTAT).

@ZANUPF_Official FAILED. Achievement = Zero

More: Pindula News