Harare (New Ziana) – THE renewed assault on the local currency manifesting through the current wave of unjustified price hikes of basic goods and commodities, and exchange rate manipulation is another illegal regime change tool being used by the country’s detractors, President Emerson Mnangagwa said on Thursday.
The local market has seen rapid price increases as businesses chase the parallel market exchange rate which shot up to USD1: ZW$400 over the past week.
This is despite the fact that local businesses access foreign currency on the weekly Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe forex auction market where the exchange rate is currently pegged at USD1: ZW$165.
Eager to see the collapse of the local currency, calls have grown, from opposition and like-minded groupings for the government to abandon the Zimbabwe Dollar in favour of the United States Dollar, which was previously the dominant legal tender during the multi-currency era.
But, despite the depreciation of the local currency, the Government is sticking to its five-year de-dollarisation roadmap, which details how the economy will transition over the period.
Addressing the seventh Zanu PF youth league elective conference, President Mnangagwa said the increasing resistance to the Zimbabwe dollar was being sponsored by economic saboteurs whose end was nigh.
“We are aware that some of our people are working with detractors to bring about regime change through the manipulation of our exchange rate and unjustified price hikes. My Government is seized with this matter and perpetrators will soon be brought to book,” he said.
“I exhort all the youths of Zimbabwe to be vigilant and expose all these deviant malcontents and counter revolutionaries.”
The Government has previously stated its confidence that fiscal and monetary measures put in place to stabilise the local currency would succeed in the long term, warning that full dollarisation would hurt the economy.
In an effort to encourage wider use of the local currency, the Government recently allowed miners to pay up to 50 percent of their royalties in Zimbabwe dollars, while all duties and taxes due on the importation of designated motor vehicles are to also be paid in ZWL up to a limit of 50 percent.
Meanwhile, President Mnangagwa encouraged youths to defend the country’s hard-won independence.
“Never be led astray by the many wolves in sheep’s clothing, roaming our political landscape. Do not sell your birth right for small trinkets,” he said.
“Defend and promote your party and its government in every circumstance which you come across. In all seasons, be principled and be unwavering members of Zanu PF.”
New Ziana
