Zimbabweans are so corrupt that if you put them in the Sahara there will no sand in a week

Zimbabwe has the most corrupt people under the sun, a reader of The Insider says.

“Even if you put them in the Sahara desert, there will be shortage of sand within a week,” the reader said in response to an article that argued that Zimbabwe had a chance to turn into an upper middle income country even if countries like the United States did not lift sanctions if Zimbabweans decide to ignore the world and set their own path to growth.

The story quoted the example of China which defied all the odds to become the second biggest economy in the world though at independence its GDP per capita was one-fifth that of Zimbabwe.

The Insider reader is, however, not alone.

Former Movement for Democratic Change policy advisor Eddie Cross said Zimbabweans were so sceptical that most, including those in business, did not believe that anything would change in Zimbabwe.

He says at one dinner that he attended, the common sentiment was: “These guys will never change, it is a year since they took power, not a single person of any stature has been prosecuted for corruption and abuse of office.”

That was before former Energy Minister Samuel Undenge was acquitted. Now it seems most of the cases are collapsing.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s call for zero tolerance to corruption seems to have become a swan song as he, like his predecessor Robert Mugabe, now seems to be surrounded by corrupt people.

Zimbabwe was last year ranked 157 out of 180 in the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index.

It was above nine other African countries, so what makes Zimbabweans believe it is the most corrupt country on earth when it was better than 23 other countries?

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