Zimbabwe: missing six zeros

Last Modified: 08 Jul 2008
By: Channel 4 News

Our Zimbabwe blogger describes the chaos of everyday banking and shopping.

Every day makes another one of your worst nightmares into reality as Zimbabwe rushes closer to total collapse.

I am writing this letter by hand as the electricity is off again; it may only return in 16 or 20 hours time.

As I write I am listening to BBC world radio and am horrified to hear that men carrying shotguns and wearing army clothes and balaclavas have raided temporary refugee shelters in Ruwa and Gokwe.

Men, women and children - already on the run from political violence and with nowhere else to go, have been attacked. It feels as if a Darfur type situation has come right into our back garden and as the violence escalates, the world watches.

It seems absurd to write about money when people are being slaughtered by uniformed men just a few kilometers outside of the capital city but perhaps it is the money crisis that will finally close everything down in Zimbabwe.

One desperate 82-year-old man told me he hadn't eaten for two days and had no food at home because all his money seemed to have disappeared from the bank.

Removing six zeros

Banks have started taking 6 zeroes off our accounts because their computers, software and accounting systems can't cope with all the digits anymore.

Almost as soon as Mr Mugabe was sworn in for his 6th term as President, everyday banking and shopping got dramatically worse as prices moved into hundreds of billions and calculations went into trillions.

As if getting your head around all the digits wasn't bad enough, the banks have not made the removal of zeroes common knowledge, or even common practice, and so panic, confusion and despair are the order of the day.

Unless you fight your way to the front of the hundreds queuing in the banks everyday and actually ask how much money you've really got in your account then you are none the wiser because maybe they've taken off six zeroes, or maybe they haven't!

One day your bank statement will show you having $1bn (nine zeroes) and the next it may have dropped to $1000.

One desperate 82-year-old man told me he hadn't eaten for two days and had no food at home because all his money seemed to have disappeared from the bank.

The $8trillion (12 zeroes) that he had (worth about 50 British pounds) had suddenly plummeted to $8m and this wasn't enough to buy anything at all - not even one single loose sweet.

For people on life-preserving medication, this disastrous cash regime imposed by the Reserve Bank has literally turned into a matter of life and death.

Maximum withdrawals

Compounding the chaos of the zeroes is the maximum limit on cash withdrawals imposed by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.

We are only allowed to draw out $100bn a day and while this sounds like a vast fortune, in reality it's only enough to buy a 500gram packet of hard biscuits.

For people on life-preserving medication, this disastrous cash regime imposed by the Reserve Bank has literally turned into a matter of life and death.

Queuing for 90 minutes to withdraw her maximum daily limit of cash, a 72-year-old pensioner told me that the $100bn withdrawal enabled her to buy just three single blood pressure pills.

Because inflation is now well over one million per cent, most shops and businesses have stopped accepting cheques now.

By the time a cheque is deposited and cleared by a bank it is worth a fraction of its original value and so without cash and without cheques we face each day with exhaustion and fear, wondering how long we will be able to survive this.