President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa’s spokesperson George Charamba says the American dollar is negatively impacting Zimbabwe’s economy by making it uncompetitive.

Posting on one of his ghost X handles, donzamusoro007, Charamba was responding to a statement by veteran economic analyst Professor Gift Mugano

“Another point – arguably the most important one – the Professor calls building “a productive and competitive” Economy one example of a fundamental. I won’t take him on on that, much as it upsets my sense of fundamentals in an Economy.

“There is a more important on which to pick up a fight with him, which is that the USD has been constraining precisely both production and competitiveness by making us very uncompetitive in the Region, and an out and out cost centre.

“That cannot be hard to grasp, surely.

“Alongside the obvious fact that the USD has been an insuperable currency entry barrier to general business in this Economy. It is a plain point which eludes the Professor!!!!,” he said.

Mugano had warned that any rushed banning of the US would be detrimental for the country.

He noted:

On mono-currency:

I hear repeated calls for the introduction of mono-currency in favor of ZiG (banning USD).

My 2 cents advice is that if GoZ bans the USD it will be the biggest loser because the informal sector will not dump the USD – GoZ will lose tax in USD.

Policy only works in a formal economy. In circumstances where the informal sector is so huge, IT CANNOT WORK!

Where we are, GOZ must let USD work as a mono currency & work on establishing the right fundamentals for the introduction of a local currency which inter alia include:

  1. Building a productive & competitive economy
  2. Building foreign currency reserves averaging 6 months import cover (US$4.5 billion)
  3. Fiscal consolidation – reducing public debt to levels averaging 30% of GDP
  4. Stable exchange rates with distortions not exceeding 10%
  5. Current account surplus
  6. Single digit inflation
  7. Establishment of strong institutions with enough teeth to rein corruption & other social ills including fostering rule of law
  8. National cohesion – credible elections, elimination of toxic politics, no crackdown of opposition & weaponization of judiciary
  9. Provision of critical enablers such as affordable & reliable electricity, fuel, transport (road, rail & air), ICT, water & sanitation, health and education.
  10. Confidence – if we put in place the points I raised from 1 – 9, we will ensure that there is confidence.

This is not a walk in the park. This will not happen overnight. If we are not careful, it will take us decades to have our local currency.

Already, we have travelled 27 years with currency crisis since the Black Friday of 14 November 1997!

The challenge I give to the GoZ is to undertake a comprehensive research focused on the need to understand why our currencies are failing & what needs to be done.

This is critical in view of the fact that we have lost many currencies in recent years!