‘It Can’t Be Any Worse’

Alternatively heralded as an incompetent fool and a tragic hero, Gideon Gono has been at the center of Zimbabwe's economic decline since he was appointed governor of the country's Reserve Bank in 2003. A ZANU-PF insider and by many accounts president Robert Mugabe's right-hand man, Gono generally keeps himself shielded from the foreign press, fortifying himself in luxury hotels or his 47-bedroom mansion in Harare. Gono is known in some circles as "Mr. Inflation" because he has overseen the printing of billions of dollars in worthless notes, most recently Zimbabwe's trillion-dollar bill, to be launched later this year. But he is more than a central banker. He is thought to have had a hand in many of Zimbabwe's controversial government ventures, from rewarding party loyalists with land to downplaying the magnitude of the cholera epidemic. In an exclusive interview with NEWSWEEK's Alaina Varvaloucas and Jerry Guo in Johannesburg, Gono addresses his critics in the international community. He blames most of his country's woes on Western economic sanctions, though Western officials maintain that the travel and business bans directed at top members of the Mugabe regime cannot undermine an the economy. Gono sees himself as a rags to riches success story with a Puritan work ethic: he says he doesn't drink, only sleeps 4 hours a night, runs daily and has a blood pressure of 120/60. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: A lot of people have blamed you for Zimbabwe's economic collapse.
GONO: The West wants you to think it's because of mismanagement. But sanctions have had quite a devastating effect on the country. I cannot think of any genocide that is worse that that. By their very nature, sanctions are supposed to induce fear. It's like terrorism. It's callous.

But the United States maintains that the sanctions are targeted toward top members of Mugabe's regime, like yourself.
They do have an impact [on me] but it is the degree of suffering that the world is missing. It's not like I'm an international persona non grata; I often travel. Quite contrary to what the world has been made to believe, the sanctions are not really hitting the middle to high-income bracket. The impact of sanctions is to deny the country access to credit facilities, and then we are unable to import fuel. Then the poor suffer.

Now the global economy is also going through a credit crunch. What do you make of that?
I sit back and see the world today crying over the recent credit crunch, becoming hysterical about something which has not even lasted for a year, and I have been living with it for 10 years. My country has had to go for the past decade without credit.

Your critics blame your monetary policies for Zimbabwe's economic problems. I've been condemned by traditional economists who said that printing money is responsible for inflation. Out of the necessity to exist, to ensure my people survive, I had to find myself printing money. I found myself doing extraordinary things that aren't in the textbooks. Then the IMF asked the U.S. to please print money. I began to see the whole world now in a mode of practicing what they have been saying I should not. I decided that God had been on my side and had come to vindicate me.

Do you feel optimistic about Barack Obama's incoming administration? I don't want anyone to put unnecessary pressure on Obama and hold him to supernatural powers. He's coming into a situation that is untenable already. By the very same standards, I don't like anybody saying if President Mugabe was to go tomorrow, the fortunes of Zimbabweans will change for the better, as if he is personally liable for our situation.

A lot of people do hold Mugabe personally liable. Wouldn't sanctions be lifted, at the very least, if Mugabe lets go of power?
[Laughs]. The sanctions will not be lifted because Mugabe leaves office. It is not about Mugabe.