From Zimbabwe To Washington: The Farce Of "Independent" Central Banks
When Zimbabwe makes the news, it’s rarely for good reasons.
There’s a good reason for that.
The country has spent years in a state of perpetual crisis.
Hyperinflation obliterated its currency and decimated the economy.
Yet beneath the surface lies extraordinary wealth.
Zimbabwe is rich in natural resources: gold, platinum, diamonds, and some of the most fertile farmland on Earth.
That’s what led me to organize a research trip there about 10 years ago alongside legendary investor Doug Casey.
We also sat down with Gideon Gono, the former head of the central bank, who made everyone “trillionaires.”
Gideon Gono was Zimbabwe’s central bank chief during the infamous hyperinflation of 2008–2009.
His signature appears on the now-iconic 100-trillion-dollar Zimbabwe note—the highest denomination of any currency ever printed.
Today, that bill is completely worthless… except as a novelty or collector’s item.
During our meeting, Gono recounted his impossible position as Zimbabwe’s central banker in the 2000s.
The country was flat broke—and it needed to pay the army.
In any country, failing to pay the military spells trouble. But in Africa, it almost guarantees a coup.
So when the Zimbabwean government ordered Gono to print money to pay the army and its other bills, he obeyed. There was no alternative.
He described it as “being in a car without gas,” yet being ordered to drive from point A to point B.
Everyone—Gono included—knew exactly where this was headed.
You didn’t need to be a financial genius to understand that printing currency to fund soaring deficits would end in hyperinflation.
And that’s exactly what happened.
The Gono episode lays bare the uncomfortable truth about central banks.
Central banks were never truly “independent.” It was always an illusion—a societal myth. They exist to siphon wealth from the public through inflation and funnel it to the politically connected.
What Gono did is no different from what the Federal Reserve is doing right now.
Just as the Zimbabwean central bank’s independence was always a sham, so too is the Federal Reserve’s. It’s a mirage—and it’s now fast disappearing.
Even establishment stalwarts like the Bank of England have explicitly recognized this. Here’s what they recently wrote:
“Central bank operational independence underpins monetary and financial stability. A sudden or significant change in perceptions of Federal Reserve credibility could result in a sharp repricing of dollar assets, including US sovereign debt markets, with the potential for increased volatility, risk premia and global spillovers.”
https://internationalman.com/articles/from-zimbabwe-to-washington-the-farce-of-independent-central-banks/