Vice President Constantino Chiwenga on Wednesday claimed that Zimbabwe has lost over US$150 billion through frozen assets, locked donor support and closed trade opportunities due to sanctions imposed on the country by Western powers since 2001.
Addressing civil servants after an anti-sanctions march in Harare, Chiwenga said that the “heinous” sanctions have hampered the country’s economic growth over the past two decades. He said:
The sanctions include financial restrictions and illegal economic measures that alienate Zimbabwe from global finance chains and the global financial system as well as bar capital inflows mainly from the West.
Since 2001, we estimate that Zimbabwe has lost over US$150bn through frozen assets, trade embargos, export and investment restrictions from potential bilateral donor support, development loans, IMF and World Bank balance of payments, payment support, and commercial loans.
This has forced our Gross Domestic Product to contract drastically in the two decades that followed the imposition of these heinous and illegal sanctions.
October 25 has been set aside as the SADC Anti-sanctions Day where countries in the region have express solidarity with Zimbabwe and call for the removal of the punitive measures.
Western countries, among them the United States of America, the United Kingdom, and the European Union imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe at the turn of the Millenium after the ZANU PF-led Government expropriated land from white farmers without compensation and parcelled it to indigenous Zimbabweans.
However, the West raised concern over the violence that accompanied the land seizures and said the land reform programme was in violation of the country’s laws and international statutes.
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