Zimbabwe in a quandary over what to do with pharmacies selling drugs in US dollars

HON. DR. O. MOYO: Thank you Madam President, I think I said it in Shona, now I will repeat it in English for the benefit of the Hon. Senator.  Basically, my answer is going to be the same in that yes, we are against those who are selling in US dollars.  Secondly, they are also claiming they are using US dollars to replenish the stocks but however, we have said that that does not make any difference.  The action that we are going to take, we have to await conclusion of decisions that are being made, discussions that are being made between my Ministry, Ministry of Justice and the Minister of Finance to ensure that we do not continue to make people suffer and make people pay in foreign currency.  Definitely, because of that shortage of foreign currency, we do encourage the pharmacies to sell in local currency which is more easily available.  That is actually what the position is.  The Hon. Senator has indicated that he wants to know exactly what it is that we are doing with regards to replenishments and securing the foreign currency and ensuring that there is transparency in the utilisation of that foreign currency.  We definitely are setting up a Committee. The Committee would be able to value the purchases and ensure that those purchases, when they come, are the correct purchases as per the initial request and that they match the initial request of foreign currency which would have been requested by the various retailers.  I also want to emphasise that we are encouraging the wholesalers to sell to the retailers at the appropriate cost so that we are able to normalise the whole situation.  Generally Madam President; there is a serious shortage of foreign currency for us to be able to fill up our warehouses at the shortest possible time.  So, it will be some time before we replenish and are back to normal.  I thank you.

THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE: The way I heard the Hon. Senator; he said there are pharmacies which were allocated foreign currency to buy the medication which they have in their stocks but now they are selling in foreign currency.  They are known and you have the list of those pharmacies, what are you going to do because even if you say you can sell in bond or in whatever currency, they are charging so much, they are making so much profit.  What are you going to do with them because that allocation which they were given is tax payers’ money, this is what is being said – [HON. SENATORS: Hear, hear.] –

HON. DR. O. MOYO: Thank you Madam President.  I thought I had answered but I will answer directly.

THE HON. PRESIDENT OF SENATE: Directly on that one.

HON. DR. O. MOYO: Yes, directly on that one.  Those who were allocated funds in US dollars and they are now selling their product in US dollars;  this is what we have said in the past, we have actually confronted some retail pharmacies and we shall continue to do.  In fact, now we have an investigative team which will be going out to check once we have given an allocation to a particular pharmacy, a retailer, we now expect them to be selling in the local currency or the currency. That is easily available.  That is actually easier to monitor because we know that we have given some US$100, the product they have in their shops is US$100, they should be selling them in the local currency that we are doing and we are sending out an investigative team who are going to be looking at that.  Next week, after we have had our meeting and also having briefed Cabinet, I am sure they will be some more thorough and more rigorous approaches which shall be taken. It is just that at this stage, I cannot say too much until I also get clearance.  We want a situation where we will be able to control and monitor all those who are selling after they have been given the foreign currency.  We are going to be doing that.

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