The Sunday Mail
Emmanuel Kafe
When the news that mbanje had been legalised broke, social media were abuzz with all the expected memes.
One of them has a young man selling sachets of marijuana seed in Harare without fear of the police.
But Health and Child Care Minister Dr David Parirenyatwa warns that use of cannabis for recreational purposes remains illegal, and the reason for the plant’s legalisation is purely scientific and industrial.
Somehow, this message has been slow to filter through.
Busani Mapfumo, an unemployed youth from Kuwadzana in Harare, says: “I only read the headline ‘Govt legalises mbanje’ and had no time to read the story.”
His fear is of a drug abuse epidemic.
Michael Mutekeri, a parent who was buying school uniforms for his children last week, said there was need to engage different stakeholders before making such laws.
“We understand that it is for medicinal use, but because the drug is and has always been prone to abuse, I fear a situation where the drug will infiltrate into schools,” he said.
Givemore Svesve, a herbalist operating in Harare’s central business district, said whilst this was a step forward for local medicine, there was potential for increased drug addiction.
Mr Freddy Maruta, a farmer, was more optimistic: “Marijuans’s revenue potential may be greater than tobacco, and we do need more products to export so as to generate forex.”
For Pastor Aaron Macheka of Bible Believers Ministries, gazetting of the Statutory Instrument marks the day “profits were placed over morals”.
“This is economics versus the breakdown of society, we were not able to manage and monitor abuse when it was being grown illegally. I can imagine the abuse now that it is being grown legally,” he said.
