Two seriously injured during food stampede in Bulawayo

By Violet Gonda
19 July 2007

At least two people were seriously injured in Bulawayo during a stampede by desperate residents, who tried to seize much needed mealie meal from a truck on Thursday. Food stores are completely empty of basic commodities as a result of disastrous price reductions imposed by the government recently.

An eyewitness said about 300 people were queuing for sugar at TM hypermarket in the city centre. They had been told that the scarce commodity would be available in the afternoon. The eyewitness said: “As they were queuing a lorry laden with bags of maize meal passed by. People started abandoning the sugar queue, running after the lorry.”

It is reported the vehicle stopped at a traffic light resulting in some people trying to jump on the truck. Some people fell off when the vehicle started moving. This resulted in a woman losing her front teeth and a man sustaining a fractured hand.

Our Bulawayo contact said the maize meal was later delivered at a downtown supermarket and police had to be called in to maintain order.

The government is continuing with these ruinous economic policies despite the negative impact they are having on the country as a whole. Many businesses have lost billions of dollars and workers are being laid off as businesses are not even covering their costs. There is no meat for the majority of the population as 90 percent of butcheries in the country have closed down. Power and water cuts have become part of a daily life of misery in Zimbabwe. The joke is that ‘ZESA has switched off the light at the end of the tunnel, to save power.’