MDC Alliance president Nelson Chamisa has called on the government to consider imposing shorter lockdowns arguing that longer periods risk triggering poverty among the citizens.
Zimbabwe is currently in a 30-day lockdown that has since been extended by another two weeks.
Chamisa longer lockdown periods are not practical since the country is highly highly informalised and most people live from vending.
In his nation’s address on the fight against COVID-19, Chamisa welcomed moves take to curb the spread of the virus but raised concern over people’s welfare.
“The unavailability of social safety nets for the vulnerable, considering our heavily informal economy, means that people will be forced to breach lockdown regulations in search of food, water, and money to cater for their families.
“This again reduces the effectiveness of the lockdown. We must be careful not to flatten the economy in our bid flatten the curve. We face the risk of a lockdown induced poverty,” he said.
He added that “It is desirable and advisable to adopt other approaches to a lockdown. We could consider a partial lockdown or a spatial lockdown or a staggered lockdown.
“Lockdowns are not meant to be permanent solutions, there is need to create a lockdown exit strategy,” he said.
Zimbabwe once promised to give the citizens some COVID-19 cushioning allowance for three months but failed.
Another 2 weeks with no cushioning allowances
However, there was no mention of cushioning allowances for the vulnerable just like with the first lockdown.
Zimbabwe has high levels of unemployment believed to be in the region of 85 to 90%.
Majority of Zimbabweans are in the informal sector where they do various activities to make a living.
Most of the ventures in the sector are survivalist in nature and do not make much money to save. Get more Covid-19 Stats from https://www.covidzw.info #OpenCovidContracts
Chamisa calls for shorter lockdowns
