Biti blasts World Bank’s Delisting of Zimbabwe, Says It’s Just  Political Deception

By Agencies

FORMER Finance Minister Tendai Biti has issued a blistering rebuke of the World Bank’s decision to remove Zimbabwe from its list of Fragile and Conflict-Affected Economies, warning that the reclassification relies on “phantom data” and ignores the crushing socioeconomic realities confronting ordinary citizens.

The multilateral lender dropped Zimbabwe from its fragility classification for the 2027 financial year—taking effect July 1, 2026—following a reported GDP acceleration to 7.5 percent and an uptick in its institutional assessment score.

Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube swiftly hailed the move as an international validation of the administration’s governance and economic turnaround.

However, Biti dismissed the reclassification as an engineered narrative designed to validate government political ambitions.

He argued that the decision was driven by political expediency rather than empirical ground-level facts, serving primarily to prop up the administration’s goal of achieving an upper-middle-income state by 2030.

“Decisions made ad hoc, anecdotally, and without empirical data are dangerous and political,” Biti asserted, cautioning that abstract macroeconomic metrics fail to reflect daily life in Zimbabwe.

The former Treasury chief challenged the official economic figures, highlighting that roughly 68 percent of the population remains trapped below the poverty line.

 He emphasized that statistical adjustments in gross domestic product and per capita income cannot obscure deep-seated structural vulnerabilities, including widespread informality, high unemployment, crippling public service decay, and what he characterized as “medieval” maternal and infant mortality rates.

Biti pointed out that political instability continues to define the nation’s trajectory. He cited persistent political polarization, disputed elections, restrictions on civic space, factional tensions within the ruling establishment, and ongoing maneuvers to extend presidential tenure limits as undeniable markers of an inherently fragile state.

While the World Bank’s revised classification may offer a diplomatic boost for Harare, experts note that it does not alter the country’s sovereign credit rating or restore access to direct World Bank concessionary lending, which remains frozen due to long-standing arrears. For Biti, masking these structural deficits with top-line growth figures offers zero relief to millions of struggling households.

Concluding his critique, Biti insisted that no amount of statistical revisionism can alter the truth on the ground, warning that institutional deception ultimately lacks the structural legs to sustain a genuine economic recovery.