Headlines : Government

Bleak Christmas ahead for weary Zimbabweans

Summary:

As the year draws to a close, bank notes have joined the long list of shortages that include food, fuel, foreign currency and electricity, triggering long queues at banks as desperate shoppers seek cash to buy necessities ahead of the holidays.

A controversial decision by President Robert Mugabe to freeze prices in June left shopping shelves bare as basic foodstuffs — many already in short supply — quickly ran out. Bread, milk, cooking oil, maize meal and sugar are hard to find but available on the black market at inflated prices. Transport problems, caused by chronic fuel shortages, have also adversely affected urban Zimbabweans’ customary trip back to rural areas in the Christmas season.

[Posted By Dilated_Rebel]

By Nelson Banya
Republished from Yahoo! News

Zimbabwe has the world's highest inflation rate at almost 8,000 percent

Workers in one of Harare’s big department stores stock shelves with luxury goods only the rich can afford, while at an adjacent bank ordinary Zimbabweans are clamoring for cash which is the latest thing in short supply.

Despite the store’s tinsel, Christmas trees and Santa Claus figurines, for most Zimbabweans celebrations will be muted in this southern African country struggling with sky-high inflation and unemployment and severe economic crisis.

“It is no exaggeration to say Christmas has effectively been removed from our calendar,” said James Toronto, a clerk with an insurance firm, as he queued outside a bank.

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Posted by Dilated_Rebel
Born and raised very humbly in a “small town” in southern California, I was a product of different worlds. Literally, part of my family descends from Mexico the rest from Portugal and Uruguay. This mixture had kept me from supporting any racist psyche found...