This year is an exciting time to be teaching history, government or civics, or economics. So many events in national politics and in the world expose the workings of government, politics and history, that teachers should have smoking scissors by the time they finish the morning newspaper.
Image from The Guardian/EPA - A Zimbabwean $50 million note in April, not enough to buy a banana; worth less than $0.01 US now
Zimbabwe’s unbelievable inflation rates are textbook cases for economics and government teachers, aren’t they? Inflation has been running more than 1 million percent for some time. Reports I saw a few days ago said inflation is now at something like 2 million percent — in a story about a new currency being printed there, the Zimbabwean $100 billion note.
Authorities last week released a new $100 billion bank note. By Sunday it was not enough even to buy a scarce loaf of bread in what has become one of the world’s most expensive — and impoverished — countries.
Is that a cruel enough example to get the attention of high school economics students?
But the story has gotten even more bizarre. Even with a government making absolutely no effort to control inflation, supply and demand can put a crunch on affairs.
Zimbabwe has run out of paper upon which to print the money to pay government workers.
So the elaborate work by the despotic Robert Mugabe to keep his hold on the reins of power, the carefully planned murders of opposition political workers, the threats of violence if the vote didn’t go his way — all of that may come crashing down. Mugabe can’t print money to pay the thugs to terrorize the people. The thugs may turn on Mugabe.
The government is reported to have run out of paper to print money and is believed to be panicking over how to pay salaries for civil servants, especially soldiers and police who are the backbone of the Mugabe dictatorship. From AllAfrica.com, a report from SW Radio Africa:
Giesecke & Devrient, the European company that was providing the paper, was last month pressured to cut supplies by the German government, after protests were threatened. In addition, a company that provides the software licences for the design and printing of the banknotes, is reported to be considering withdrawing their contract.
The military has helped run the country for some years now and the Mugabe regime needs to sustain military and police operations in order to maintain political control. There is much consensus among observers that Mugabe’s recent decision to sign the Memorandum of Agreement with the two MDC formations was clearly based on increased economic pressure. One English pound this week is trading at Z$1.3 trillion.
Earlier in the week, Mugabe was out of the country trying to negotiate a power-sharing agreement with his opposition, Morgan Tsvangarai. What power will be left to share?
The software for the notes, which is supplied by a Hungarian-Austrian company called Jura JSP, is reportedly very technical. The UK Guardian newspaper quoted a ‘knowledgeable source’ at the Zimbabwe government’s Fidelity Printers, who said the software issue was a major problem and had created an air of panic. “They are in a panic because without the software they can’t print anything,” the source added.
Helmoed-Romer Heitman, the South Africa correspondent for Jane’s Defence Weekly (a global military security publication) said the situation faced by the regime is quite typical of many African countries that are falling apart. He said the result tends to be at least violent demonstrations, if not a mutiny by the military.
“Given the current situation in Zimbabwe, I am inclined to think that a lot of the military, certainly middle ranking officers and some seniors, are not all that enamoured of the party that is running the show”, said Heitman.
Oh, and that 2 million percent inflation?
With experts estimating that the inflation rate is currently at 15 million per cent, and pressure on those doing business with the Mugabe regime increasing, the economy has proved to be the straw that finally broke the camel’s back.
Observations: First, these are great examples to use in classes, stark contrasts of inflation out of control. Second, Mugabe is riding a tiger, finally, after holding power for several decades. He should study the words of Winston Churchill. Churchill wrote, in While England Slept:
“Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.”
If you read this blog regularly, you may wonder with me, is there a malaria problem in Zimbabwe? If so, how will the wackoes blame all of this on Rachel Carson?
Resources:
- Historical reference: In 2006, inflation was only 1,000% (where was the Bush administration on this issue?)
- Inflation went over 1 million percent earlier this year
- CIA World Factbook entry on Zimbabwe
Posted by Ed Darrell 
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