We, the Zimbabwe Chamber of Informal Economy Associations (ZCIEA) acknowledge the State of Nation Address by His Excellency President E.D. Munangagwa where he extended Level 4 lockdown by another 2 weeks as Government measures in the fight against COVID 19 continue.
As the President presented his statement he also noted how the lockdown has negatively impacted on the informal sector and how the rates of infections and deaths have tremendously gone down as a result of the effort. It is against this background that we take note of bullet point 11 of his Excellency’s presentation, which states that Informal markets may open on condition of observing WHO protocols. Some of these protocols according to our research are mask up, sanitizing or washing of hands, social distancing, temperature checks.
As an organization, through our structures in our various territories across the 10 provinces of the country, we are making positive efforts in assisting our members and other general informal members to observe these protocols and start to work. We are engaging local authorities of which some we have Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with, to partner in this process as we look forward to the opening of markets. We trust this should allow for work to resume for informal economy workers and traders especially in the face of aggravating COVID 19 effects. We will be monitoring progress on the ground and working with the local authorities with the hope that they will be receptive to this cause.
#MaskUp
#WashHands
#FightCOVID-19
#DecentWorkForAll