Affirmative Action Group has expressed concern over the takeover of Barclays Bank by a Malawian company saying Zimbabwe will soon face another economic colonization.
By Jeoffrey Ncube
Addressing a press conference in Harare on Tuesday, AAG President Chamu Chiwanza said Zimbabwe cannot have a British controlled, black owned bank since the equity will still go back to foreigners.
“We can’t have a bank being controlled by a British and being run by a black ,now the equity is going back to foreigners and soon or later, foreigners will impose their own managing directors and expect us to keep quiet, we will not allow that one to happen in Zimbabwe,’’ said Chiwanza.
He said laws must be observed by everyone and there must not be any segregation on who will go above the law or not.
“The law is the law, it must be observed, we have 12 million Zimbabweans looking to take up equity in Zimbabwe and we have said as AAG that this is the thing which does not happen in 2 or 5 years, it might take 100 years but it’s a process and if you are doing a process, it have to start somewhere.
“If we are expecting a precedence of saying we have a law but Ministers agree in their offices that this is what we are going to do undermining the law at the expense of 12 million Zimbabweans and then the foreigners take over stake whether African foreigners or not, the fact remains the same, they are not Zimbabweans and very soon Barclays will have a foreign director, so are we progressing or retrogressing?
“The law is the law, the Reserve bank or whoever ,must observe the law, the indigenisation law says the locals have got the first right of refusal and surely the Reserve bank should have asked that they are selling Barclays to FNB Malawi.
“Are there no other Zimbabweans who are interested with the same kind of money to buy this equity that’s what we are saying,’’he said.
Meanwhile AAG argued that the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe as the regulator should have interfered in stopping the takeover of Barclays Bank by a Malawian company.
Chiwanza added that AAG is going to investigate if this deal was done properly or not.
“Barclays is listed at the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange so why are we trading our God given rights, the Reserve Bank have the mandate to interfere and we are going to push them and we want to see if this deal was done properly, what criteria was used and we want to know for the first time the Central bank will not interfere since in the past they interfered in ZB issues and now its void when it comes to Barclays,’’Chamu said.
