Tendai Ruben Mbofana
Information Ministry Permanent Secretary Nick Mangwana recently took to social media with a shocker.
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He proclaimed that President Emmerson Mnangagwa has “restored our dignity as Zimbabweans” and that those in the diaspora who once felt embarrassed to claim their heritage can now hold their heads high.
This bold declaration coincided with President Mnangagwa’s visit to New York for the United Nations General Assembly, where he addressed diaspora communities and painted a glowing picture of the nation’s economic trajectory.
In these air-conditioned conference rooms, the narrative is one of undeniable triumph: surging gross domestic product, reined-in inflation, a stable local currency, and a flood of new investments.
To cap it off, in an irony completely lost on state officials, diaspora remittances have actually surged.
In the eyes of government officials, this is a resounding success story of national redemption.
But behind the polished rhetoric and international handshakes lies a troubling question: whose reality does this narrative actually reflect?
Have the everyday lives of ordinary Zimbabweans truly improved, or are we simply being asked to celebrate an illusion?
If one asks Zimbabweans living abroad, the feeling is rarely one of newly restored pride.
In truth, many feel more embarrassed and burdened than ever.
The true barometer of a nation’s health is not found in diplomatic speeches, but in the economic reliance of its people.
The reality is that diaspora Zimbabweans are being forced to work longer hours and stretch their budgets to send even more money back home to support desperate family members and friends struggling to make ends meet.
While the state eagerly celebrates skyrocketing annual diaspora remittances—which have ballooned from $1 billion in 2020 to $2.45 billion in 2025—this surge is hardly a badge of honor.
It is a damning indictment.
Rising remittances do not signal growing wealth.
They point directly to deepening local poverty and an absolute failure of the domestic economy to sustain its citizens.
There is no more revealing statistic than this.
We may brag on the global stage at the UN General Assembly that our macroeconomic indicators are green, inflation is at record lows, and the currency is rock-solid.
Yet those figures mean lower than nothing when families back home cannot afford basic survival without a monthly lifeline from abroad.
Zimbabwean relatives must routinely pay more visits to Mukuru, WorldRemit, or Western Union just to secure their daily bread.
A genuinely growing economy would mean citizens telling their loved ones in the diaspora to send less money—or stop sending it altogether—because they can finally stand on their own two feet.
Instead, money transfer agencies have effectively replaced traditional banking institutions.
When queues at Mukuru dwarf those at ZB Bank, it does not depict a thriving nation; it exposes an economy in structural collapse.
We must stop deluding ourselves with statistical propaganda.
Real dignity does not originate from a podium in New York or state media broadcasts.
It begins in the kitchens, classrooms, and pockets of ordinary citizens back home.
As long as mothers cannot feed their children, parents cannot pay school fees, and patients are turned away from dilapidated public hospitals, there is no dignity to speak of.
Worse still, the breakdown of economic self-reliance has degraded our social fabric.
When young people feel compelled to humiliate themselves on social media in hopes of catching the eye of politically connected “tenderpreneurs” for a handout or a car, our collective self-respect is shattered.
Headlines profiling shady figures distributing cash and luxury vehicles like confetti—in a nation where roughly 90 percent of the population lives in poverty—do not display prosperity.
They strip Zimbabweans of their honor and turn the nation into a global laughingstock.
Look out onto the streets of Harare and other cities, where pavements are overflowing with informal vendors desperately competing to earn a few dollars for dinner.
What dignity is being restored to them?
True national dignity will only arrive when ordinary Zimbabweans begin to feel the actual benefits of the growth figures proudly presented to the World Bank and IMF.
True dignity is achieved when families no longer depend on remittances from abroad just to survive another month.
Until a paycheck earned at home can buy a life of security, all the political speeches in the world remain hollow.
Dignity is measured by prosperity at home, not promises made abroad.
- Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to contact him on +263715667700 or mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com