'Modern NRZ increase freight 2.8 to 4.5 m tonnes by 2023' - pariah state's vision 2030 mirage

The National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) is being upgraded in line with President Mnangagwa vision of creating an upper middle-income economy by 2030.

"We are working on installing modern electro systems that we saw in Indonesia and China so that we do away with the current system," Advocate Martin Dinha, NRZ Board Chairman, told Sunday News.

"The new system will be a high voltage system that will operate on the railway line and it will be very dangerous for anyone who would want to tamper with it because the whole railway line will be live at any given time,"

NRZ's 2020-2030 strategic plan will "transform NRZ into a modern railway system and move from the 2,8 million tonnes per year carrying capacity achieved last year and to 4,5 million tonnes by 2023, reach an apex of 6 million tonnes by 2025 and up to 12 million tonnes by 2030."

The country spent millions of dollars on the overhead electrical system in the early 1980s and it was supposed to last 80 years, at least. The system was in service for less than 20 years and it started coughing blood. The vandals stole the copper conduct, delivering the coup de grace to the system.

A high-voltage third-rail system, NRZ is proposing, is all very well in countries where there is no unauthorised access on the rail track by humans or animals. Other than in marshalling yards like Dabuka, most of NRZ's rail network is accessible to man and beast 24/7. The live third-rail will have to be carefully shielded to prevent electrocutions.

President Mnangagwa has said by 2023 Zimbabwe generating enough electrical power to meet the nation's energy needs with surplus for export. So why is NRZ building solar farms to meet its own electricity power needs? It should focus on its core function of providing the nation with any efficiency and reliable rail transport service for goods and passengers - something it is clearly failing to do at present.

NRZ has 10 locomotives in service out of fleet of 67! This is wilfully inadequate for nation with a 4 313 km rail network!  

In 2019 there was a big song and dance over the launch of joint venture between NRZ and a group of private investors to supply locomotives, wagons, coaches, etc. needed to kick start the railway service to its former pre-independence glory. The President officiated at the handover of the first batch of locomotives.

None of the new locomotives were ever used because the had the wrong rail gauge! How anyone missed something as obvious as that, beggars believe! The joint venture has since been dropped, the millions of dollars of public money spent has been written off and we move on - a very familiar tale in post-independence Zimbabwe.

Right now, Zimbabwe is in the middle of the corona virus pandemic with no exit strategy. The country needs to vaccinate 10 million people to reach head immunity and so far government has sourced enough vaccines for 500 000. Whereas other nations like SA are set achieve head immunity by the end of this years, Zimbabwe will be luck to do so by the end of 2022!

The country's public education and health care services have all but collapsed after decades of being starved of funds.

So where is Zimbabwe getting the money to bankroll these ambitious NRZ project when the nation has no money to buy corona virus vaccines and failing to pay teachers and nurses a living wage, etc.?

IMF, WB and most other international financial institutions have long stopped giving Zimbabwe any financial assistance because Zanu PF government are known for being wasteful, corruption and for failing to repay the debts. Even the Chinese, "our all-weather friend" as Mugabe called them, have largely stopped loaning money to Zimbabwe for exactly the same reasons - wasteful, etc.

Ever since the Zimbabwe's independence in 1980, the country's economy has been in decline because Zimbabwe is a pariah state ruled by corrupt, incompetent and murderous thugs who have rigged elections to stay in power. And as long as the country remains a pariah state there will be no meaningful economic recovery. None!

But of course, Zanu PF has never acknowledge the country's relentless economic decline and the ruins. As far as the party is concerned, it promised the nation "Mass prosperity!", "Gutsva ruzhinji!" It has not delivered mass prosperity yet but it is on the right track!

Zimbabwe was a middle income nation in 1980 and is one of the poorest nation today. It is only the few ruling elite who are filthy rich and doing so at the expense of the millions of our people are now living in abject poverty. The party will insist mass prosperity for the majority is only round the corner.  

We are going to have "a modern NRZ will be moving 4.5, 6.0 and 12.0 million tonnes by 2023, 2025 and 2030 respectively, up from the present tonnage of 2.8 million!" This is just one pixel of the Zanu PF's cloud cuckoo land collage!