Robert Mugabe and His $250,000 Birthday Party

Zimbabweans were treated to a $ 250,000 birthday party in honor of their octogenarian President, Robert Mugabe three days ago and it left me very angry at the goings on in that country.  He is at the helm of a failed state, the economy is in shambles and the ordinary citizen of Zimbabwe is the most pathetic human being roaming the plains north of Limpopo.

To appreciate the seriousness of the Zimbabwean financial system, only recently they came up with a 100 billion Zimbabwean note! If anybody knows Zimbabwe well, then you probably will see my reason for being  really sad on this occasion of Mugabe’s birthday. $250,000 is by all standards, a stupid and wasteful expenditure! Look at this way, 1 British pound sterling is equivalent to about  Zim$ 1.2 billion!! The Economy is soaked in massive bank notes that go to the tune of 1000 trillion and this has only escalated the galloping inflation which is perhaps the highest the world has ever seen

 The fracture in the economy is so serious that Zimbabweans now loathe their legal tender. In schools, Administrators have decided to demand that school fees be paid in the form of goats and cows because their money has lost inspiration as a medium of exchange for goods and services. A loaf of bread costs 500,000,000 Zimbabwean dollars! It is not uncommon to see people going to the banks  with sacks to collect their salaries. Money purses have lost purpose in this part of the world.

The birthday party in my view was a big waste of valuable resources and many Zimbabweans know this. For instance, school teachers are currently being paid $100 US dollars per month and the payments are usually in areas, hence by simple mathematics, the $250,000 would have paid 2500 Zimbabwean teachers this month but Mugabe decided it goes up in smoke within a few hours of party festivities.

We are glad nevertheless,  that the power sharing deal has worked out. We now think Morgan Tsvangirai will add new ideas to the management of Zimbabwe as a country and hopefully sanity will return to the economy of this once great power of Southern Africa.   Already, the new finance Minister has started causing a change on the value of the Zim dollars by slashing  two zeros off the bank notes. This is a good move in the right direction.