Gradually, Then Suddenly
ZIM45, 2006, 5 Thousand ZWN

Slot Comment:

2nd Dollar Emergency Bearer Check AB Prefix - $5,000

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Note Details

  

Set Details
Note Description: 5000 Dollars 2007 - Wmk: Zimbabwe Bird
Grade: 66 EPQ
Country: Zimbabwe
Note Number: ZIM45
Signatures/
Vignettes: 		- Sign. #8
Certification #: 8087274-002
Owner: Revenant
Set Category: World
Set Name: Gradually, Then Suddenly
Slot Name: ZIM45, 2006, 5 Thousand ZWN
Research: See PMG's Census Report for this Note

Owner's Description

Another contemporary program / “Operation” from this period is “Operation Chipo Chiroorwa (“Ladies, Get Married”), which started / was announced in early March 2007. The nominal goal of this program was to rid urban areas of prostitutes by encouraging them to get married. The operation criminalized and arrested women seen out alone in the evening and charged them with loitering and soliciting.

I don’t know if this operation was launched in response to a perceived spike in prostitution, but, even if there was a spike, I doubt those in the government had the self-awareness to see their culpability in causing it. The stall / shop / business owners that saw their shops destroyed in 2005 under Operation Murambatsvina where disproportionately female according to some references. This program also launched only about 5 months after Operation Chikorokoza Chapera (“No Illegal Panning”) wiped out another alternative for earning a living in a wrecked economy. If you make it hard enough to earn a living to buy food, people will find a way.

But it should also be acknowledged that this program was not the first or the last in a long succession of programs with this same basic intent. Operation “Chinyavada” (“Scorpion”), aka Operation “Clean up” had the same basic purpose and approach in 1983. There was another similar program in 1986-1988 in the lead up to a visit from Pope John Paul II. There was another in 1991 in preparation for a visit from Queen Elizabeth II with the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting. There was another in January 2011 called Operation “Chengetedzai Hunhu” (“Maintain your dignity”) and Operation “No Loitering” in February 2013. There may have been some start-stopping, but I think you have to see the 2011 and 2013 programs as essentially direct continuations of the 2007 one and see the whole thing as one effort that lasted for at least 6-7 years - and that’s only if you don’t see the whole thing from 1983 to 2013 as one, long, continuous, 30-year targeting of unaccompanied women by the government and police.

With the message “get married,” Chipo Chiroorwa, in particular, was criticized for targeting unaccompanied women and not the men that were the clients / customers and for the patriarchal tone that suggested that women cannot - or should not - be independent. But I think that is clearly baked into all of these “Operations” and just a lot more explicit with the 2007 effort.

Where the balancing rocks are a major design feature on the front of the banknotes, with the checks of this series they appear only as part of the seal of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.

On the back, the bearer checks of this series feature different designs, emphasizing things of national or cultural significance, much like the first dollar banknotes that came before them. In that regard, these bearer checks are a bit of a cross between the bearer checks and the banknotes of the first dollars in terms of design.

On the back this note shows an image of Kariba dam, but it is not the same image that originated on P-1 (along with an image of a tigerfish) That artwork was re-used on the P-43, P-55, and P-60 in this series. The artwork on this note seems to be a re-use of the image on the back of the P-9, 100 ZWD note from the 2nd Series 1st Dollar notes. This note and the P-9 are the only notes I’m aware that use this artwork.

The Kariba Dam is a double curvature concrete arch dam in the Kariba Gorge of the Zambezi river basin between Zambia and Zimbabwe. The dam stands 128 meters (420 feet) tall and 579 meters (1,900 feet) long. The dam forms Lake Kariba which extends for 280 kilometers (170 miles) and holds 185 cubic kilometers (150,000,000 acre-ft) of water. It was designed by Coyne et Bellier and constructed between 1955 and 1959 by Impresit of Italy at a cost of $135,000,000 for the first stage with only the Kariba South power cavern. Final construction and the addition of the Kariba North Power cavern by Mitchell Construction was not completed until 1977 due to largely political problems for a total cost of $480,000,000. During construction, 86 men lost their lives.

This note is a bit of a rarity in my Zimbabwe collection in that it is a note I submitted for grading myself! I bought 3 raw bearer checks - one each of P-40, P-45 and P-46(b) and sent them into NGC with some traveler’s checks (P-15 to P-20) to fill in some holes in my collection. I was happy to score this 66 EPQ, gem-uncirc grade to help round out this set with a note that’s pretty much in line with / of the same quality as a lot of the rest of the set - I always tried to stay at least in the Gem Uncirc. (65+) range.

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