How Zimbabwe can solve its current debilitating cash shortages

Here is what I think about how Zimbabwe can solve its current debilitating cash shortages once and for all within a week or two as of today 4th June 2016 rather than wait for the 200 million bond notes expected in October, while civil servants' bonuses continue to be deferred since seven months ago due to lack of money (see New Zimbabwe.com, ‘Government shifts civil servants bonus pay dates,' 03/06/16). Several other state responsibilities have been set aside, though Mr Mugabe has reportedly clocked about 200,000km flying in 6 months, gobbling $80m (Newsday, ‘Mugabe clocks 200 000km flying in 6 months, gobbling $80m,' 04/06/16).

However, Mr Mugabe could easily get more than US$200 million if he changed his mind on granting the estimated 3-4 million Zimbabweans abroad the right to vote and dual citizenship. At the stroke of the pen of doing so money and investments will pour into the country and one does not need to be one of those several self-appointed prophets to know that. It's just that simple. The new Constitution adopted in March 2013 allows for diaspora vote and dual citizenship like other normal countries, but the stumbling block is Mr Mugabe's intransigence, bloated ego, selfishness, vindictiveness, short-sightedness, arrogance, obstinacy and stubbornness which is now taking the country back to the era of the economic meltdown of 2008/2009 characterised by hyperinflation, mass unemployment, severe food shortages, hunger, and corruption.

So in short, Zimbabweans should demand that to save face, an extraordinary session of  Zanu-PF's central committee must be convened to adopt an urgent resolution allowing for a diaspora vote (allowing people abroad to vote in the country's presidential elections) and to immediately be granted dual citizenship as was automatically given to Mr Mugabe's grandson who was born in Singapore without any red tape. The politburo would need to urgently endorse that resolution for the sake of progress and save the country's economy from total collapse at any time soon.

Consequently, Mr Mugabe would need to announce those vital changes as soon as possible as long as he is still in the country and await the certain positive results as Zimbabweans abroad remit more foreign currency from all over the world enough to restore confidence for Direct Foreign Investment. Only that solution can solve the country's current financial crisis without resorting to printing the Zimdollar as bond notes under some guise of pseudo US dollars.

Please pass on this message to Mr Robert Gabriel Mugabe and circulate to everyone on Facebook or Whatsapp, Twitter and other social media so that Zimbabwe can become the breadbasket of Africa again. Let the debate start NOW.

Dr Clifford Chitupa Mashiri is a social science doctoral student in London. Email: Zimanalysis2009@gmail.com