by Brightface Mutema
Now that Washington chose to renew the economic restrictions on Zimbabwe with Trump signing into effect the revised version of ZIDERA, it is not the politician but the ordinary citizen who will experience the harsh reality of these sanctions.
Depending on the side of the political coin you are, choose to call them targeted restrictions or broad sanctions but the results can hit hard the lay man in the street. Suppose I choose to dine with those who adamantly deny that these are real sanctions but targeted measures against certain individuals, I want to let bare that it is not in the terminology you use but the effects of the whole thing on Zimbabweans.
It defies meaningful logic that the bread winner in a family is put under an economic embargo and one expects his/ her dependents to survive free of the results of that embargo. It is virtually impossible and one would be forced think that those responsible for the sanctions are not sincere in their intended outcome.
If the targeted sanctions were anything to go by, since the initial enactment of ZIDERA in 2001 Zimbabwe would now be just but a smouldering brand of fire ready to be extinguished. But alas we managed to face reality and be innovative about life since necessity is the mother of all inventions.
Still, the US is not ashamed of itself and slapped us with a renewed version ZIDERA. What is this for? A number Zimbabwean graduates have turned I to vending and other forms of in formal trading all in effort to evade the lifely hardships inflicted on them by the sanctions. Didn’t the politicians continue with their opulent life even with sanctions in place? This does not need one to put on some magnifying glasses that it is the ordinary citizen who is at the receiving end.
Surely there can never be any form other serious crimes against humanity than rejoicing in the suffering of an ordinary citizen in Zimbabwe because of this draconian foreign policy by the US. Of cause you are taking the respect of human rights as one of the pre-condition for the removal of these sanctions but you are losing sight that in so doing, you are even violating the same basic human right you are clamouring for. Grave double standards!
For close to two decades now, Zimbabwe has known no emotional and economic peace all because of the economic sanctions. We risk having a whole generation going down the drain because those whom we look up to want to be mean and selfish. We cannot deny it, we need you America, you were blessed first before us but with kind of treatment you are giving us we are forced to make do with whoever rejoices and grief with us.
Zanu PF administration has suffered the worst of your ridicule because of the economic doldrums in the country but you forget that you closed and continue to shut the conduits to our development through ZIDERA. Surely we are not worthy a dime of this perpetual suffering because of the so called targeted sanctions.
Our fathers and mothers are not able to work for the family and so the kids are suffering. This is the time we can boldly claim that it is better to have a big hurt at once by clearly cutting ties with you than having a generational time of little hurts brought by your shameless ZIDERA.
