Vusumuzi Dube
Harare Bureau
Zimbabwe’s Gross Domestic Product has risen from US$20 billion to US$40 billion in the past five years despite the illegal sanctions that have been imposed on the country by the United States of America and the European Union as the Second Republic introduced transformative initiatives to spur economic growth, Vice President Constantino Chiwenga has said.
He was addressing a huge gathering of mainly civil servants gathered in Harare this morning to commemorate the annual Anti-Sanctions Day that was initiated by Sadc in 2019.
“Whilst the first two decades of the illegal sanctions wreaked havoc on us and devastated our economy whose highlight was the economic collapse of 2008, Zimbabwe is learning to survive under the siege and scourge of the sanctions. We have come to realise that economic growth does not come from handouts but from using the resources endowed to us by the Almighty God,” said VP Chiwenga.
“Despite the sanctions, in the past five years, we realised growth that has seen our Gross Domestic Product surge from around US$20 billion in 2018 to over US$40 billion this year. Our growth potential, however, is far greater than what we are managing now, all because of the degrading effect of the heinous sanctions.”
The Harare event was the main one after the Government lined up a cocktail of activities across the country to commemorate the Sadc-initiated day.
Bongani Ndlovu