Gono Blasts Greedy politicians

This was extracted from Section 7 of the Midterm Monetary Policy Statement

7. INDIGENISATION AND EMPOWERMENT

7.1 As Monetary Authorities, we fully support the noble objective of empowering the majority of Zimbabweans through the introduction of enabling statutes that expand wider involvement of the people in the mainstream economy.

7.2 Noble as this objective is, however, our well considered advice to Legislators and Government in general is that a fine balance should be struck between the objectives of indigenization and the need to attract foreign investment.

7.3 Specifically, the local-foreign ownership thresholds must be taken and implemented as down the horizon targets, as opposed to excitable but impractical overnight conversion events.

7.4 Our view is that the above gradual approach promotes fair valuation, reasonable return of initial investment outlays by investors, as well as smooth transition from old to new shareholders.

7.5 Where foreign investors bring in clear long-term benefits to the country, a reasonable degree of flexibility ought to be exercised in allowing investors to hold, at least in the initial stages, majority shareholding so as to deliberately accord them escalated dividends that enable them to plough back their initial investment outlays.

7.6 Beyond pre-agreed time thresholds foreign shareholding can then be diluted on a gradual win-win basis, in line with the otherwise noble objectives of indigenization and empowerment.

7.7 As Monetary Authorities, we also call upon Government to ensure that the empowerment drive is not derailed by a few well connected cliques, some who are already making the most noise in ostensible support of this initiative, who would want to amass wealth to themselves in a starkly greedy but irresponsible manner, whilst the intended majority remain with nothing as happened in the past with respect to Government empowerment schemes such as the land reform programme.

7.8 In the world of finance, it is a recognised fact that CAPITAL is a timid commodity, which always stands ready to jump ship at the slight inclination of attack whether factual or perceived.

7.9 As they say, charity begins at home, we must, therefore, ensure that existing foreign capital in our economy acts as our ambassador for attraction of more investment inflows.

7.10 Of particular concern to us as Monetary Authorities would be any attempts to forcibly push the envelop of indigenisation into the delicate area of banking and finance.

7.11 To this end, we call upon those with interests in the financial sector to approach the Central Bank with their applications for new banking licenses.

7.12 These applications will however, be subjected to vigorous vetting, in line with the Reserve Bank’s normal pre-licensing scrutiny, as opposed to any inclination towards unstructured interventions into the shareholdings of the sector.

7.13 Generally, we believe that 27 years down the road, there should be no free lunches as such.

7.14 It is important to note that this comment comes against a background of reported incidences involving a number of senior and well-connected personalities who are already positioning themselves to muscle into certain mining, manufacturing, financial and other entities that are currently performing well and contributing to the foreign currency inflows of the country.

COMMENT: Dr Gono is not afraid to grab the bull by its horns. Since he took office, he has always been against economic looters. His only weakness is that he sometimes gets over excited and just dish out money, contributing to inflation. However, if he becomes Minister of Finance in a Makoni government, then hoooray! It will be party time! Makoni will be able to put checks and balances so that Gono does not step out of the line while Gono himself, as Finance Minister, will be able to unleash all his energy to propel Zimbabwe forward. Imagine a Makoni-Gono combination! I know some people would like to point fingers but most of the accusations are hearsay! On this blog, I will only deal with facts that we know. I have heard people say Gono is corrupt. Those are rumours and not facts. A country can not be run on rumours. What we all know as fact is that Gono has publicly condemned looting. His monetary policy statement quoted in this article is a clear example. We also know that the honourable Makoni has hit out at greedy looters. That is a fact. One need to ask themselves, if Gono is really corrupt, why is he not being exposed since he has created a lot of enemies by openly attacking a corrupt regime. The good Dr sometime pours out scorn with reckless abandon. Dzimwe nguva ndinotombomutyira.