Ncube out of touch with reality
FINANCE minister Mthuli Ncube has forgotten what he was appointed for and needs someone to spell out his duties. He is now behaving more like a politician than a technocrat.
All along people thought Ncube was going to breathe life into the ailing economy, unfortunately the man has now become a full-blown Zanu PF politician and has dismally failed to reform the institution and to exhibit his knowledge in economics.
The problem is when people start bootlicking and towing the Zanu PF line, reasoning starts evading them.
Ncube is now a certified politician spending much of his time campaigning and focusing more on grabbing a parliamentary seat than solving the economic challenges facing the nation.
The country is facing economic collapse and this kind of behaviour on the part of the Finance minister of forcing shops to sell in local currency while ignoring the economic fundamentals affecting the country will not solve anything.
This kind of political grandstanding and posturing is barbaric and tantamount to thuggish behaviour.
Ncube must realise that businesses have no choice but to dump the local currency which has been useless for some time.
All fuel players in the country are charging exclusively in US dollars, but they have never been subjected to this kind of tomfoolery.
The market is very stubborn and it will not pander to Ncube’s hallucinations.
We are slowly going back to price controls. The socalled second republic is nothing, but a replica of the late former President Robert Mugabe’s regime. The rate at which the country is being pushed back to default settings is astounding.
Ncube is failing to come up with a clear-cut economic plan for the country to move forward. He is resorting to hit and run type of economic policies based on command tactics borrowed from Zanu PF.
This command economics will not work at all. Price controls are now back with a bang and the country will be turned into a black market. Ncube has no clue of the underlying problems businesses are facing. He has now become law unto himself. Pulling down price tags in a supermarket does not solve the problem but will actually exacerbate it.
Why is the government charging US dollars for one to acquire a passport and at tollgates? According to Ncube, every transaction within the country should be in local currency. Transacting in foreign currency should be prohibited and criminalised.
It’s a pity that Ncube and his bosses are not in sync with modern economic dynamics. They are using military and guerrilla tactics which are outdated and are destroying the economy.
His monetary policies have failed and the best gift he can give Zimbabweans is to call it a day.