Zimbabwe says banks have credible plans to sell stakes

Harare / Reuters

Foreign banks operating in Zimbabwe have submitted credible plans on how they intend to transfer majority shares to locals, the country’s finance minister said on Saturday, reducing the chances the government could cancel their licences.
Under an Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act all foreign companies operating in Zimbabwe were given a March 31 deadline to sell at least 51 percent of their holdings or have their licences cancelled, part of President Robert Mugabe’s black empowerment drive.
Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa said empowerment plans from Barclays Plc, Standard Chartered Plc, Old Mutual Plc and its two banking subsidiaries as well as South Africa’s Standard Bank and African banking group Ecobank were consistent with the law.
“I am pleased to advise that all the affected foreign-owned financial institutions operating in Zimbabwe have submitted credible indeginisation plans before the deadline of the 31st March 2016,” Chinamasa said in a statement.
Chinamasa is leading efforts to end Zimbabwe’s isolation from the West and trying to woo the International Monetary Fund, which has previously said the government should ease up its economic empowerment law to attract investment.
His comments come two days after another cabinet minister said most foreign banks and mining companies in Zimbabwe had not complied with Thursday’s deadline to transfer majority shares to locals.
Under the empowerment rules, foreign-owned financial services companies will have to sell at least 20 percent of shares directly to locals, while empowerment credits, such as funding for agriculture and youth and women programmes, make up the balance.
Mugabe’s black economic empowerment drive has unsettled foreign investors, some of whom fear that Harare could grab their assets in the same way that the government has seized more than 6,000 farms from white commercial farmers since 2000.
Government says the move is aimed at empowering the majority black population who were disadvantaged by colonial rule, but critics say the law has benefitted President Robert Mugabe’s allies.
The International Monetary Fund has urged Zimbabwe to review the policy to give investors reassurance.
Mugabe has in the past threatened to nationalise foreign companies that refuse to comply.
Zimbabwe’s economy has been on a downturn for more than a decade-and-a-half since Mugabe’s government oversaw the often violent eviction of white farmers under controversial land reforms.