Im don’t keep my cash in Zim banks- President Mugabe

Charles Mabhena

The Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has admitted that Zimbabweans including himself are hiding cash in bedrooms at the time the country is facing liquidity challenges, saying the act of hoarding cash is justified.

In his traditional birthday interview beamed on the national broadcaster ZBC, Mugabe who turns 93 today made the revelations that it is justified that people are keeping their monies in pillows because when they bank it they may not be able to withdraw it.

“Dzimba dzizere mari (These houses are full of money). If we were to unleash the soldiers and the police into the people’s homes; house by house and dig for the hidden funds, not to take the money, but with the idea to uncover this economic ill, and report to us who are hoarding cash.

“You will be guilty, I will be guilty, and I don’t know who would be found innocent on this one, because we are afraid to bank it and lose it.

“It is not your fault, it is not my fault, and it is not his fault, it is the fault of the system that has not yielded enough cash,” he said.

Mugabe’s confession comes at the time the country is facing liquidity challenges, amid the failing economy, limited exports, and capital flight which was purported to have been plugged off by the introduction of bond notes, a currency that cannot cross Zimbabwe’s borders.

Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor John Mangudya has been shouting aloud that one of the major reasons of bringing the bond note was to tame the externalisation of cash (capital flight), saying it was killing the financial sector as the cash was not be put into formal circulation.

While that (capital flight) argument makes economic sense, Mugabe’s confession would pile more headaches on Mangudya in the fact that money may not be crossing borders per se, but, it is still out of circulation as big earners like Mugabe and his family are stacking cash in their bedroom pillows.

The country has been struggling for liquidity the situation that has seen banks limiting the amount of cash one can withdraw.