Oneword

My Mama always told me that the Good Lord gave me a head to think with and not only to keep my ears apart so that I could wear glasses.

Looking at our good friend and neighbour, Zimbabwe, I note that there are a myriad of voices claiming this and claiming that about their liquidity or illiquidity.

So, I listened to my Mama and took what the Good Lord gave me, applied it as best as I could and came up with the following:

Barely a month ago, Dr. Gono, the governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, issued dire threats that the Z$ 200 000 bill would become history with effect from 1 Jan 2008. At the same time he announced the introduction of the Z$ 250 000, the 500 000 and the 750 000 bearer cheques. Then it took another week to settle the teething problems .. and we are at the end of the FIRST week of January.

OK, while this was going on, Gono and his people must already have been hard at work to design, proof-print, sign off the proofs and authorise the printing of the next bunch of "currency"! Right, Of course!

The process above does not take only a day or two!

So, while the people and commerce were struggling with the first bunch of new notes (bearer cheques is too long to write out every time), Gono had issued the orders to the Zim private money printing press ( a subsidiary of the ZRB!) to start printing the next lot of billions and billions of Zim Dollars; this time in the denomination of Z$ 1 milllion, 5 million and 10 million! And this is the second - ok - third week of January!

Printing all those billions of Zim Dollars must have cost a pretty penny (real money like Rand or US$) because the ink is ok, the paper is ok and the printing itself is ok and there are security features. Not cheap, in other words.

What did he use to back the printing of billions and billions of Z$? Mahala, Nothing!

All he did is increase the supply of worthless currency in circulation. That, in turn, will further spur on inflation and ... probably ... he is already contemplating the next print run with other, even higher, denominations.

Now, what does that tell you? That Zim swims in gold, diamonds, uranium, chrome, oil, jatropha, maize, wheat??

No! It tells you only one thing: Zimbabwe is swimming in useless, worthless money and is technically, morally, realistically, ethically and practically bankrupt!

No Mbeki, Mboweni, Shilamba, Nujoma, Alweendo, Gordon Brown, Queen of Sheba, Queen of Ophir, Queen of England, World Bank, the Illuminati, Bilderburgers, George Bush, Emperor of China, Pirates of the Caribbean or any other real or imagined person or persons can counter that plain fact!


No, for all the gold in China, I cannot tell you but that, in my considered opinion (and however painful it may be because of the suffering people) ZIMBABWE IS, INDEED, BANKRUPT!