It’s hard to describe the grind of daily life in Zimbabwe without baffling people with numbers, percentages and statistics that are so unreal they are uncomprehendible. The cash crises that has crippled us for years has been one of those undescribable things. The last few months have been horrific.
This morning I once again saw red when I opened my month-end bank statement.
Yesterday I had a balance in my account of $2,000 (at old value that is 20 trillion dollars / $20,000,000,000,000.00). This account is dormant, untouched for months.
This morning I find I owe the bank $500,000 in service fees for one month’s bank charges to hold my $2,000. This is no joke.
The joke may be the $4 interest I received or the $0.80 cents withholding tax that I am paying, but my sense of humor is weak today and I cannot even laugh at that!
As I write this the parallel / black market rates are as follows USD1 = ZWD2500 and ZAR1 = ZWD360.
These rates will change within an hour.
The daily cash limit, per person per day is now a whopping (ha, ha) $20,000 (USD8, ZAR55.56).
The cost of a personal cheque book at today’s price (it will change by tomorrow) is $2,000,000 or $33,333 per page.
You pay $33,333 (USD13.33, ZAR92.59) to receive $20,000 (USD8, ZAR55.56).
Does this make sense to you?
(Via Blog This is Zimbabwe)
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