Zimbabwe Finance Minister says country has turned the corner

We must of course recognise that these recent gains are not accidental, nor are they the result of good fortune. Instead, they are the outcome of the deep-rooted, long-term reform agenda we began to undertake almost three years ago.

Working according to the Transitional Stabilisation Programme, a step-by-step roadmap for economic recovery, we have gone about systematically reforming the very foundations of the Zimbabwean economy. We set ambitious targets — too ambitious some claimed — and we met over 80 percent of them.

These included running a Budget surplus for the first time in modern Zimbabwean history, successfully floating our own currency and after some volatility, seeing it reach relative stability and supporting the increased supply of locally manufactured goods, rising to 45 percent on market shelves from just five percent in 2017.

For the first time in many years, exports exceeded imports, creating a balance of payments surplus.

When the reforms caused short-term uncertainty and upheaval, there were voices calling for us to shelve our agenda and return to how things were.

But we stood our ground, confident in our plan and guided by the President’s frequent citing of Margaret Thatcher’s famous statement during her own reform drive, “yes the medicine is harsh, but the patient requires it in order to live.”

This does not mean we are resting on our laurels. Far from it. The true benefits of these reforms are yet to be felt by the majority of the public, who still struggle. There is much, much more to do.

But what we can say definitively is that we are on the right track, and the world has begun to take note. We must stick to our principles, remain steadfast and disciplined, and keep going.

There will be bumps in the road, and we are still a long way from reaching our goals of a prosperous Zimbabwe for all. But I am confident that we have now reached the “end of the beginning” of our economic journey. And as long as we stay the course, we too will prevail.

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