Bumper harvest of thorns

via Bumper harvest of thorns – The Zimbabwean 4 March 2015 by Jera

Emmerson ‘Ngwena’ Mnangagwa has been contemplating the sorry state of the economy. Unemployment is over 80%. The industrial sites of Workington and Belmont are as silent as graveyards and, come April, the once productive commercial farms expect another bumper harvest of elephant grass and thorns.

After mulling things over, the VP, using his analytical legal mind, has arrived at the conclusion that the cause of all our troubles is – wait for it – bureaucracy. When a crocodile swims in a shallow pool, with its jaws visible above the surface, there can only be one explanation if the zebras avoid the pond: danger lurks in the water.

VP Mnangagwa insists investors avoid Zimbabwe because of bureaucracy. He is the second most powerful man from Beitbridge to Mavhuradonha, but has offered no suggestions as to how best we can unravel the tangle of red tape supposedly choking the gateway for investors. Many will disagree with the VP.

If anything Zimbabwean business laws are lax. In nine months, mining firms have withheld an estimated $200million in taxes – because nobody has troubled to make follow ups. ZIMRA has failed to reign in tax dodgers, so much that it is offering 5% tax discount plus an amnesty from prosecution until December, for those owning up. In America, for example, cash deposits over $10,000 are investigated. Zimbabwe is one country where the taxman is not too fussy about the legitimacy of earnings. Cash deposits of any magnitude are permitted, nobody seems to care whether one deposits drug money or cash from bona fide business activities.

Government’s key function is creating suitable conditions for investment. What will Mnangagwa do to woo investors? Perhaps he can remind them that he is trained to kill.

Here are the some of the REAL reasons the country is a pariah state shunned by investors: