In his policy, the RBZ Governor indicated that minimum withdrawals have been upped to Z$200 (revalued or Z$2 Trillion old currency) which falls below the Z$2.5 trillion per day as suggested by the ZCTU.Â
In our letter dated 22 July 2008, the ZCTU also called for the review of the minimum withdrawals to be reviewed after every three days to cushion workers against transport costs that are rising everyday. The call was necessitated by the fact that as a Workers Representative Board, the ZCTU was receiving numerous calls from members who faced serious problems, simply because they could not access cash from their accounts.Â
When the letter was written to Dr. Gono on 22 July 2008, transport costs were around Z$150 billion for a round trip to and from work, and by today, the average transport is around Z$350 billion for the same round trip.Â
The ZCTU does not see how the monetary policy would solve the problem of inflation. We also do not know how the introduction of the old coins would solve our problem of shortage of currency as the new coins would soon be rendered useless by the galloping inflation.Â
The ZCTU is also concerned that issues related to the tax threshold have not been adequately addressed, resulting in workers being short-changed.Â
The $5 Trillion threshold which was announced by the government comes far short of the Poverty Datum Line (PDL), which now runs into more than $14 Trillion for a family of six.Â
The ZCTU therefore observes that yesterday’s monetary policy and tax threshold are simply a dump squibs and it would not hesitate to call upon workers to exercise their right to be heard.Â
Wellington Taylor Chibebe
Secretary General
31 July, 2008