via ZimDollar return inevitable: Biti 04/02/2014 NewZimbabwe
MDC-T shadow minister of finance Tendai Biti on Tuesday said the unpopular Zimbabwean dollar will inevitably come back whether the Zanu PF government likes it or not.
“We cannot print the US dollar, our currency printing press is not working and it will work sooner rather than later,” Biti told reporters at his party’s Harvest House head office in Harare.
“They will have no option, they have struggled to pay salaries and this will deepen even further and the only way out will be to revert to the Zim dollar.”
After years of hyper-inflation which peaked 231 million percent, the local currency was finally ditched in January 2009 in favour of a basket of multiple currencies among them the United States dollar, South African rand and the Botswana pula among others.
The list has since been expanded to include the Chinese Yuan, Indian rupee, Japanese yen and Australian dollar, in a move that will effectively make those currencies legal tender.
“These new currencies that they are bringing don’t bring any difference as long as the economy is dead. The economy is dead and we are in an era of deflation,” Biti said.
“We as the MDC we have no doubt that the Zim dollar is coming back. We have no doubt about it. The Zimbabwean dollar will come back because they (Zanu PF government) are in a deficit situation, they have moved from prime balancing or budget balancing,” Biti told journalists in Harare this afternoon.
The former finance minister added: “They moved away from that into deficit financing. They are borrowing money. Now when you go into deficit financing into will get into a situation where you have to repay the person that you borrowed. They are borrowing because they are not collecting sufficient revenues to cover their current expenditure.”
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) recently announced that the Chinese Yuan, Japanese yen, Indian rupee and Australian dollar will be accepted, with Zimbabweans and exporters able to open accounts in the various currencies.
“We are already using the pound, euro and pula but you hardly see these currencies in circulation in most parts of the country. The new currencies are likely to suffer the same fate,” said economic commentator John Robertson.
Biti said the financial statements of the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority in the last quota of the year failed to meet its target by 18 percent warning that the “deficit is going to widen.”
“What we do know as MDC is that they are no longer collecting sufficient to pay the wages. So they are going to get into these increasing situations where they will fail even to pay salaries,” Biti said.
“They will have to print money to monetize this deficit that they are creating, so whether they like it or not the Zimbabwean dollar will come back just as much as the US dollar came against their volition,” Biti said.
Biti said there is need to deal with the supply side of the economy. “We need to get industry get kicking again and working again.”
COMMENTS
They can rig the ballot but not the economy
That will be the final nail on the economic coffin.
There is an old saying “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. Right now it would appear the Zimbabwe economy is doing just fine using the U.S. Dollar as its currency. To return to the Zimbabwe Dollar, with the government presses churning out millions a day, would simply once again destroy an already fragile economy. However, common sense seldom prevails with the present government, whose members only concern seems to be lining its own pockets whilst its citizens live in poverty…
But these guys are in a real fix! How do they pay the workers if they do not receive enough revenues? Some how they have to come out of this vicious cycle and print money! RBZ plse restart the machines, call Gono back! This thing of increasing the number of foregn currencies acceptable as legal tender will have no impact at all because the diasporans are not going to increase their remittances in response. The problem is with revenues vs expenditure as opposed to restriction of currencies used for transactions! So the illiquidity will persist.
Nobody will accept any currency printed by these people. If they try this money will only be used to pay taxes. The shops will empty and you will only be able to buy from the back door using real dollars.
If the Zim dollar comes back it will be time for me to close doors and leave. Sorry about the 65 people I employ, but it will fail us fom the start, and I have no doubt many will follow suit!
I wonder if my Z$6,000,000,000,000,000,000 in my bank account will be useable again.
What has become of zanpf’s promise to resusitate th economy under their governanace???Oooops! I am asking a stupid question. This won’t happen. zanupf rigged the election, but one thng they can’t do, and that is rig the economy.Hahahaha
careful you dont just wake up one morning to find your US $ in your bank suddenly converted to Zim $ at their own exchange rate……
That is exactly what is going to happen If they announced it would you give them you forex????.zanupf are consuming the taxes at an alarming rate in salaries and producing nothing.It is going to happen.
Munzwa, there is no doubt at all that is what is going to happen, those with US$ in the bank are going to rue the day and lose out big time. ZANU will take US$ offshore and replace them with their own printable rubbish. Get your money out of the bank as soon as possible.
They have been buying time since 1980 nothing has changed.
Oh, to be in Rhodesia again.
Rhodesia was better than this.
Is that the reason why they want to bring gono back,he has the wrong experience that will work well for zpf,I wonder what crime you really committed gedion,inenge sure nezvagire.
Yah lafa elihle
Biti is suggesting tht if he was stil Min of Fin he was going to bring back the Zim $ under the circumstances. He cant proffer any new solutions. What a shame to shadow (ghost) minister!!
Biti said no such thing. He is predicting that this Government will be forced to bring back the Zim dollar We wait and see if he is correct.
Mucha… Didn’t you practice comprehension on school!
Biti has always said government needs to reduce expenditure. Foreign trips and the like. We all know that Bob can’t do this. His political patronage system won’t allow him. He lacks the balls to control goods errant goons. So the only option will be to print zim solar to finance their lifestyles.
nhamo iya yauya zvakare love to be a trillionaire again aluta comrades
@ umwrong remember the old T shirt ( Pre vote Zanupf T shirts ) that said Rhodesia Is Super with a caricature of an elephant. That should now read Rhodesia was super with a pic of a Jongwe. Us old timer remember the good days but the youngsters know no different. We don’t want a white government again but a good prosperous and progress Zimbabwe that ALL Zimbabweans – irrespective- can be proud of and united in, and only good times can achieve that.
Good. Let the zanu comrades suffer.
They have created this mess through their own stupidity and incompetence – so now let them suffer. They chose to make enemies of the west – so fine. Not one single person in the EU, the US, Canada or Australia [or Brasil and Argentina] is thinking about Zimbabwe right now? No – if anything – they’re laughing at Zimbabwe.
Mucha you are like your grandfather Baba Bona unongotuka munhu pasina mhosva Biti is just saying his opinion.Zanu ndiyo iri panyanga so they must fix the economy.
What Chinamasa wanted to do is bring in the Chinese Yuan. The other three currencies were just a smoke screen. He knows Australia will not support its currency circulation in Zimbabwe. He is hoping to persuade China to flood the market with Yuan.
But the Chinese are waiting with glee. They can easily decide to pump anything up to 100billion Yuan into the RBZ, and in return, will claim all the diamonds, all the platinum and all the Gold in Zimbabwe including that which has not yet been mined including, if they want all our wives.
We will use the cash to pay civil servants and within a year, its finished. Kunenge kuroodza amai. At the same time the shops will run dry. Back to square one. That is the cost we have to pay for allowing visionless people to run the country. These doctorates have failed us. maDr, Prof ekutenga aya have sold our future including rukuvhute!
Godobori sounds convincing. Perhaps China Massa was told we cannot give you dollars but Yuan, Yes! Pilot study project for Beijing; stepping stone for the Yuan into Africa. Yawn…
The only way to to keep using the US doller is to use it at the correct value, Bread doesn’t cost $2 it costs 60 cents but the import tax it costs to bring produce in to the country makes companies overcharge due to the mark up they need to make to keep their business alive. Unless Zimra lower the taxes and the government support working farms that provide local produce instead of stripping them the Zim doller is the only way.
If people think 2009 was bad, i’m sad to say these coming years will be alot worse! 2009 we still had other countries investing in new companies but sadly due to the indigestion laws they will think twice about putting money up to give 51% of their company to a local for nothing.
A Chinese has no friend BUT focus on what he needs out of you.Muchadura. Muchachema. Muchadhamba. Thomas Mapfumo wakaimba karekare early 90s.
The best way is to cut off Civil Servants Employment and Government spending by at least 50 percent.
Send these workers all into productive jobs and force them to
sit on a tractor.
Than there will be no deficit left over.
When they can no longer pay the police and
no longer pay, or even feed the army the whole thing will collapse
I bet you guys had listened to Ian smith
Stop stealing guyz remember we are still in struggle,stop stop stop.
Mdc is out of government, and the economic hardship and problems resurface. Where is the link? Surely the ordinary man suffers. In EVIL politics , politicians destroy the country that they want to rule. Zimbabwe lacks the right crop of political leaders.