THROUGHOUT 2025, authorities choreographed a narrative of stability so aggressively that anyone questioning it risked being dismissed as an alarmist, unpatriotic or anti-progress. State media machinery went into overdrive, while carefully selected figures were paraded daily. Exchange rate “stability” became the slogan, while inflation “control” became the mantra.
But as the propaganda played out, factories were dying quietly. Supermarkets were collapsing, while mines were retrenching. Workers were going for months without salaries, and entire families were sliding into survival mode.
This newspaper warned repeatedly that what Zimbabwe was witnessing was not genuine economic recovery, but a managed illusion of progress.
It was stability without growth, and confidence. What we were fed with were numbers without production, and statistics without livelihoods.
Now the country’s own official statistics agency has confirmed exactly what ordinary Zimbabweans already knew from empty pockets, shrinking salaries and shuttered businesses.
ZimStat figures released this week showed that more than 65 000 workers lost their jobs within 90 days during the second quarter of last year. For an economy in trouble, this was too huge a number coming out of the harshest phase of the country’s prolonged economic meltdown.
Keep Reading
- DeMbare fire blanks in drab draw
- ‘Inflation could shoot to 700% by April next year’
- New perspectives: Inflation control critical for economic growth
- Inflation spike: Why interest rates aren’t the answer
That is not “stability” but economic distress speaking through statistics.
The data exposed a labour market buckling under closures, retrenchments, liquidity shortages and collapsing productive sectors. Official unemployment stood at 20,7%, translating to more than 833 000 unemployed working age Zimbabweans nationally. Among youths aged between 15 and 24, unemployment surged to nearly 40%.
Even more revealing is the structure of employment itself, where out of 3,18 million employed Zimbabweans, only 1,14 million remained in formal employment, while nearly 60% survived in the informal sector.
This is not the structure of a healthy economy but an anatomy of survival.
The tragedy is that authorities had every opportunity to level with citizens. There is nothing wrong with trying to inspire confidence in markets or maintain calm during turbulence. Every government does that. But when optimism mutates into denial, and propaganda begins replacing reality, dangerous policy mistakes follow.
People make wrong investment decisions, companies miscalculate risk, and governments delay corrective action. Ultimately, citizens lose trust as reality catches up. The warning signs were always visible last year.
Retail chains were shutting branches, mining companies were terminating contracts and manufacturers were battling power cuts, weak demand and rising costs. Banks were quietly restructuring, as informalisation was swallowing the economy whole.
Yet the official messaging remained disconnected from lived realities.
One of the most striking findings in the ZimStat report is not simply the scale of job losses, but the collapse of dignity attached to work itself. Zimbabweans are increasingly working harder merely to remain poor.
As a mining union warned this week, entire communities are being condemned to poverty while billions worth of minerals are extracted from beneath their feet. Retail sector leaders warned at the time of widespread business collapse, while economists are saying “stability without growth” risks creating a stagnant economy trapped between paralysis and propaganda.
These are warnings coming from workers, economists, businesses and now official government statistics.
The country cannot tax its way out of decline, or slogan its way into prosperity. As we have been warning, it cannot spin liquidity shortages into growth. Real economies are built through production, jobs, investment confidence, functioning industries and rising household incomes, not press conferences.
ZimStat deserves credit for releasing data that reflects realities many had tried to suppress.
In the end, statistics do not queue for maize meal, they do not hunt for school fees, or panic over rentals.
People do.
And after months of official optimism colliding violently with lived suffering, the jobs numbers are now saying what millions of Zimbabweans have been trying to say all along — we are burning.