The Sunday Mail
Lincoln Towindo and Wallace Ruzvidzo
ZIMBABWE has been under the yoke of economic sanctions imposed by the United States of America for close to two decades now, and the devastating impact of the embargo on the country’s economy is unquestionable.
How the sanctions have directly hurt individual citizens remains a subject of debate in some sections. The US insists that the sanctions are “targeted” at a group of listed individuals and companies, and they have no impact on the millions of Zimbabweans who are not listed.
It is only the listed individuals, their argument goes, that have been harmed by the embargo. On the other hand, Zimbabwe contends that it is the ordinary citizens who have suffered the full brunt of the sanctions. .
Here we explore the experiences of three individuals — one who is listed and two others who are not specified under the sanctions regime and have no direct links to any of the individuals and companies that are targeted by the sanctions regime.
Matonga shines bright
Bright Matonga is a former Deputy Minister of Information and Publicity in the previous Government and has been under US sanctions for nearly a decade and a half. Matonga was slapped with US sanctions sometime in 2006 along with several other Government ministers, senior civil servants and the top leadership of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces.
He was listed primarily for his role as Government spokesperson, where he used his role to become the face of defending the Fast-Track Land Reform Programme. His listing came along with a travel ban, asset freeze and attendant restrictions on international transactions.
“Basically, I was Government spokesperson and at the party level, I was given that role again by the late Dr Nathan Shamuyarira who was the ZANU PF secretary for Information,” Matonga told The Sunday Mail.
“I took those roles to defend the Land Reform Programme, which is the reason why we have economic sanctions. We were able to send our message across, locally first to our people so that we were on the same wavelength, and then, of course, to the international community. The following year, in 2006, I was then added to the sanctions list together with all Government ministers, a number of civil servants and the top tier of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces.”
But Matonga said as a listed individual, although the sanctions have had an impact on his personal and business life, they have hurt the ordinary man who has had to contend with a faltering economy.
“I can’t talk about how I have been affected as an individual because these sanctions were never targeted,” said Matonga.
“In fact, they target the Zimbabwean people and Government but under the guise of being targeted at top politicians. It is the ordinary men and women who are suffering because it is very difficult for them to do something as basic as an international transaction.
“The truth is that the sanctions are not having an impact on only those people who are said to be targeted, but it is the ordinary man who is suffering because the country cannot, for example, import drugs. So we have people dying needlessly in our hospitals.”
Matonga said he continues to transact internationally, mainly through proxies, because funds transferred in his name will be frozen.
“Ordinarily, when you are on the sanctions list, it means you cannot transact via international channels because the money will be frozen,” he said.
“You cannot receive money sent by business colleagues or relatives because, again, it will be frozen. But this does not mean I cannot transact. While they have put me down as an individual under sanctions, it means I cannot transact or receive money under the name Bright Matonga.
“But this does not mean I cannot transact, I just cannot do so under the name listed on the sanctions list.”
Collateral damage
Kuda Musasiwa is a trailblazing youthful businessman known for founding tech-based agri-business start-up, Fresh In A Box.
Musasiwa has no known links with the so-called ZANU PF political elites and listed individuals. In fact, he was a prominent member of Evans Mawarire’s #ThisFlag campaign and managed MDC Alliance spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere’s campaign for the Mt Pleasant National Assembly seat in 2018.
Going by the US’ logic, Musasiwa should be insulated from the vagaries of the sanctions, since only the targeted elites and companies are affected by the sanctions. However, that is not the case as Musasiwa has known only terror from the sanctions. His small enterprise has suffered collateral damage.
Often Musasiwa has taken to social media to vent his frustrations with the sanctions, much to the chagrin of his associates in opposition political circles.
His annoyance stems from the blocking of Zimbabwean registered businesses from online payment portals and difficulties in settling remittances locally.
In August he sparked debate on Twitter after posting a message saying that his business’ bank account had been blocked on account of the sanctions.
“This paragraph got me. I’m not on the “targeted” sanctions list, I’m not a member of the ruling party, but my small company has had its business account closed overseas. They said it’s coz (sic) of the country I was operating from,” he tweeted.
He posted a picture of an email, ostensibly from the payment platform, notifying him that the platform’s terms of use do not accept “businesses registered and operating from Zimbabwe”.
He told The Sunday Mail that his Zimbabwean-registered tech start-up has been constrained from transacting on popular payment platforms, which encumbers its ability to compete on the global market. He said popular online payment systems such as PayPal have blocked all Zimbabwean accounts out of fear of offending the sanctions regulators.
“I am not on the sanctions list personally, but the US has a financial division that monitors all transactions,” said Musasiwa.
“The problem we have is as soon as we receive money on behalf of our delivery system they start to say you could be assisting sanctioned individuals to launder money.
“Many of our platforms and banks are terrified of facilitating transactions from Zimbabwe because they could be accused of assisting sanctioned individuals.
“So there is now a blanket ban on Zimbabwe through the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in the US. This has stopped small businesses like ours from penetrating the international market.
“The sanctions are inhibiting exports, innovation and keep smart Zimbabweans from the international market.”
Sanctions killing it
University of Zimbabwe graduate Shaziah Shahadat is a tech-savvy fashionista who runs Fashion Killing It Boutique in Harare.
She runs most of her business through electronic or e-shopping, and when Facebook announced that it was launching Facebook Shops to facilitate seamless buying and selling online, she was ecstatic.
It took her no time to try to register an account so that she could order the latest fashion from all over the world for her local customers.
Her joy soon turned to sorrow when she was informed that accounts registered in Zimbabwe could not register because the country was under sanctions.
“Facebook introduced real live time shopping for Instagram and Facebook during the peak of Covid-19,” she told this publication.
“As a small enterprise owner, I was very excited to launch my virtual shop. The worst happened when I least expected: ‘Sorry, we cannot do business with you; your country is on sanctions’. This means that young entrepreneurs based in Zimbabwe such as myself are excluded from participating on such platforms because of the sanctions.”
Shahadat said sanctions do not affect political elites but ordinary people.
“It crashes every passionately driven young person who is eager to create a clientele all over the continent,” she moaned.
