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Sunrise II - Index of articles and reports on Gono's attempt to change the currency in 2007
Zimbabwe
bank chief abolishes top bank note
Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA)
December 19, 2007
View
article on DPA website
Johannesburg/Harare -
Zimbabwe's central bank chief late Thursday said he was withdrawing
the country's current highest denomination bank note in a last-ditch
bid to outwit cash hoarders.
In a long-awaited statement
shown live on state television, Gideon Gono said that from January
1, the 200,000-dollar bearer cheque would no longer be legal tender.
'The cash barons prefer
these notes,' Gono said as he also announced the introduction of
three new bank bills.
Clearly in a combative
mood, the central bank chief detailed a list of malpractices he
said were contributing to Zimbabwe's biting cash shortages, which
have seen customers sometimes sleeping outside banks to obtain only
paltry sums.
Zimbabwe's economy has
been in free-fall since 2000, when President Robert Mugabe launched
his programme of massive land reform. Agricultural production has
dropped sharply.
Annual inflation is now
running at more than 14,000 percent, unconfirmed figures say. Though
many shops have been poorly-stocked since July due to a state-ordered
50-per-cent price slash, the goods that are available shoot up in
price frequently.
Gono, who was forced
to slash three zeros off Zimbabwe's currency in August last year,
said 65 trillion Zimbabwe dollars out of a total of 67 trillion
currently in circulation could not be accounted for.
'Who has got that money?
The money is in the hands of a few barons,' he said.
He charged that supermarkets
were selling cash at a profit and only depositing a fraction of
their takings into bank accounts; bank employees were selling cash
on commission; and top officials were engaging in lucrative black
market mineral and foreign currency deals.
He said central bank
staff, tax inspectors and anti-money laundering personnel were being
deployed at every bank in Zimbabwe to check on cash deposits made
in the days up to the year-end deadline.
But there would be no
repeat of police cash searches and roadblocks seen during the last
currency changeover, Gono said.
'We're saying this time
'round no roadblocks, this time 'round no searches. Bring all your
trunks [of money] to the banks,' Gono said/ He warned that surveillance
cameras would be filming depositors.
Banks will be forced
to open during the weekend to cater for the anticipated increase
in cash deposits.
The new bearer cheques,
which will be in circulation from Thursday, are in denominations
of 250,000, 500,000 and 750,000 Zimbabwe dollars.
Officially the US dollar
is worth 30,000 Zimbabwe dollars, but at the dominant parallel market
rate of exchange, it trades at 100 times that amount.
Gono said he had ignored
calls to slash three zeros from the currency again because last
time the business community went on the next day and started increasing
prices.
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