HARARE – Price increases for goods and services in Zimbabwe point to a “sinister motive”, President Emmerson Mnangagwa said on Tuesday as his government ramps up pressure on business.
Vice President Constantino Chiwenga last week accused businesses of “practising financial terrorism” after prices went up in response to the declining value of the country’s RTGS currency introduced in February this year.
Mnangagwa, in a statement ahead of Workers Day on Wednesday, accused businesses of “profiteering tendencies”, while urging workers to “remain resilient”.
“The wanton, unjustified increases in prices are unpalatable and may point to some other sinister motives. This conduct must stop forthwith,” Mnangagwa said, on the same day that the country’s biggest mobile phone company, Econet, raised its prices by over 100 percent.
“My government will not stand by and leave workers and the generality of our people at the mercy of a small group with rent seeking and profiteering tendencies.”
Information Minister Monica Mutsvangwa, speaking to reporters following a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, said ministers had agreed plans to make foreign currency available to businesses to “procure raw materials for the production processing.”
“The government is very concerned about price increases and is therefore putting in place mechanisms to ensure foreign currency is made available to the business community. This will go a very long way to stabilising supply of foreign currency which is essential to stabilising prices. Given this initiative, the government is appealing to businesses to exercise restraint and not to increase prices,” Mutsvangwa said.
Mnangagwa called on employers to use Workers Day to “reflect and evaluate the welfare, remuneration, conditions of service, safety and state of workers.”
The government recently added an average RTGS$129 to the monthly pay of its workers, but union say it is derisory.
In the same week that the government effected the increase, bread prices almost doubled to RTGS$3.50 from RTGS$2. A wave of other price increases were observed on basics like sugar, cooking oil and the staple maize meal.
Mnangagwa hailed Zimbabwe’s diaspora, saying his government recognised their “hard work and sacrifice” through which their remittances are sustaining their relatives back home.
