& as IMF talks tough with Mugabe

s the country’s deepening economic crisis and to bridge the widening rift between the world lender and Harare.
Official sources said Gakunu told Mugabe that Zimbabwe’s economy was deteriorating rapidly and its recovery depended on restoring business confidence and an orderly land reform program.
Zimbabwe is in its seventh year of recession and the IMF has predicted that inflation will breach the 4,000 percent mark next year. Analysts expect worsening food shortages early 2007, raising the spectre of civil unrest, after a sharp decline in farm output caused by disturbances on white-owned farms invaded by pro-government militants since February 2000.
Finance Minister Herbert Murerwa, who also attended Thursday’s meeting, was quoted by the official media saying government had complained to Gakunu why the lender had not resumed lending after it repaid US$193 million earlier this year to clear its arrears on the fund’s critical general resources account.
Gakunu reportedly told Mugabe “that should not be an excuse for not dealing with macroeconomic problems.”