In Zimbabwe's crisis, surviving means improvising, and some luck

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Filling a tank used to require just a few minutes. Now it takes a day of patience and some ingenuity at the gas station. Even then, success is not guaranteed.

HARARE - In crisis-stricken Zimbabwe, where prices are soaring, the local dollar is plummeting and time is always short, even a trip to the gas station can be an adventure in the struggle to survive.As the sun sets on Harare, Tinashe Magacha is about to spend the night in his car, like hundreds of motorists in the queue, hoping to refuel the minibus he uses for work.

For months, lines of cars stretching for several kilometres at petrol stations have become the latest manifestation of the economic ruin left by Robert Mugabe, who died on September 6 almost two years after a coup ended his 37-year rule. Forced to pay his bus tickets in hard currency to go to work, Crispen Mudzengerere must spend hours at his bank to withdraw, if he is lucky, at best 100 dollars in cash."To get 20 dollars, I need to spend 26 dollars. I have to pay for my own money," he said.

But hustling cannot solve everything. The first victim of the crisis has been the value of wages, destroyed by hyperinflation -- 175% in June -- and the depreciation of the local currency.The toll has been harsh. Wakanai Murambidzi, a cleaner in a bank, was unable to pay her children's school fees. They were forced out of school earlier this month."We regret removing Mugabe," she said, referring to the military coup that ended the former president's reign in 2017.

Sheltered under an umbrella, Chiona sends text messages of shopping lists to delivery drivers, known as "malayitsha" or couriers in Ndebele language, who travel back and forth between Zimbabwe and South Africa with minibuses full of passengers and goods.

 

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