– Zimbabweans will stay home Friday after their government declared a public holiday, saying people should demonstrate against U.S. sanctions rather than work.
Sanctions against some individuals in the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front and businesses associated with them were imposed back in 2003. The U.S. has made periodic amendments to include people the State Department believes are responsible for human-rights abuses or enriching themselves at the country’s expense.
The sanctions are “an act of terrorism against Zimbabwe,” said Zanu-PF’s spokesman, Simon Khaya Moyo. Zimbabwe has received more than $3 billion in U.S. aid since 1980 and at least $300 million this year alone, the U.S. Ambassador to Zimbabwe Brian Nichols said in an interview with newspaper publisher Trevor Ncube that was posted on the U.S. embassy’s Twitter page.
The U.S. is Zimbabwe’s single-biggest donor. Despite diplomatic tension between the two countries, American aid kept Zimbabweans from starvation after former president Robert Mugabe authorized the often violent seizure of about 90% of all white-owned farms between 2000 and 2012. That cost the country millions of jobs and saw farm exports almost disappear.
“Our targeted sanctions are not responsible for Zimbabwe falling tragically short of its potential. The fault lies in the catastrophic mismanagement by those in power and the government’s own abuse of its citizens,” Nichols tweeted Thursday.
