Zimbabwean Vice-President Joseph Msika has warned that businesses in the country will suffer if they fail to stock their shelves with goods, reports said on Wednesday.
Msika, who was speaking in the east of the country, said President Robert Mugabe’s government was at war with retailers and manufacturers.
”We are at war. We will not allow shelves to be empty,” Msika was quoted by the official Herald daily as saying at a meeting in Nyanga on Monday.
”Now we will not allow it. We will do it [crackdown on offenders] in a manner that you will squeal,” he said.
Msika’s comments follow reports some shops have stopped restocking following the imposition of sweeping price controls.
His comments echoed those of Mugabe late last month when he promised the business community a rough day for continuing to hike prices amid an economic crisis marked by inflation of more than 4 500%
His government then sent teams of police and state agents to shops and factories around the country to order prices cut by more than half.
As a result, shop shelves have rapidly emptied of basic goods like sugar, cooking oil, flour and meat, sold at knockdown prices to hordes of bargain-seekers.
Fuel stations have run dry after they were told to sell fuel at a third of its value, and outlets for luxury goods like stoves and televisions have not been spared.
Retailers warned at the outset they would not be able to restock their shelves if they were forced to sell at a loss and, unsurprisingly, some shops have closed their doors.
The Herald quoted an official from a chain of supermarkets that has closed some of its branches this week as saying the closures were due to persistent power cuts.
”We have not deliberately closed down some of our outlets but they have been closed due to power cuts being experienced,” Nhamo Marandu, a marketing manager for the OK supermarket chain, was quoted as saying.
”We have generators but we have no fuel, so we cannot operate,” he said.
Police spokesperson Oliver Mandipaka confirmed on Wednesday that 3 509 shop owners and company officials had been arrested since the price controls were imposed on June 26.
Most have appeared in court and paid heavy fines.
Adultery allegations
Meanwhile, state media on Tuesday published photographs said to have been taken by a camera hidden in the bedroom of Zimbabwean Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube, claiming they show the outspoken government critic undressing along with a woman named in an adultery case.
Ncube’s lawyer has called a civil adultery case filed on Monday against Ncube an ”orchestrated attempt” to embarrass him.
The lawyer added Ncube would deny the allegations in court when the case begins at an unspecified date. The archbishop declined to answer questions about his private life in a state television interview, but spoke of the importance of forgiveness.
Ncube has repeatedly accused President Robert Mugabe of human rights violations and called for him to step down. The cleric has also urged Zimbabweans to take to the streets to demonstrate against the government amid the nation’s worst economic crisis since independence.
On Monday court officials were accompanied by a state television crew when they delivered documents to Ncube at his office at St Mary’s Cathedral in Bulawayo, alleging he was involved in a two-year affair with a secretary whose husband was demanding damages in a civil suit. — Sapa-dpa, AP