Is the coin mint in Bulawayo a white elephant?
The mother of an eight-year-old girl at a private school in Bulawayo will never forget the day when she ran out of small change and gave her daughter a $5 000 bearer’s cheque. The little girl, who usually got a daily allowance of $500 or $1000, depending on her mother’s mood, discovered that with the bearer’s cheque, she could buy ice cream, snacks and a drink, and remain with some change. When her mother gave her the usual $500 the following morning, she rejected the money insisting she wanted a bearer’s cheque. Her hard-up mother had to give in after the little girl went into a tantrum. Zimbabwe’s currency, which until the end of 1982 was stronger than the United States dollar, the rand and the pula, has lost so much value that some Bulawayo residents are questioning the rationale for the continued existence of the coin mint factory in the city, which the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe refuses to acknowledge is now a white elephant. Launched with pomp and ceremony on August 31, 2001 when t
