Staff Reporter
Government has blacklisted nineteen companies who were involved in channeling funds to the black market leading to inflation increase.
In a statement yesterday, Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Professor Mthuli Ncube said that the nineteen companies would channel the fund to the black market after receiving their payment from the Government.
“It has been observed that some contractors after passing through the Value for Money process and having received their payment from Government still tend to siphon their proceeds into the parallel market thereby causing domestic inflationary pressures.
“In this regard this statement today is to give an update on findings from the work conducted by the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) on monitoring payments made to Government suppliers as well as measures to deal with non-compliant Contractors with a view to plug parallel market dealing,” said the Minister.
Professor Ncube articulated that the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) noted that the nineteen companies would also do transactions which are not in line with their businesses upon receiving their payments from the Government.
“The FIU has noted that upon receiving their payments, the companies would engage in spontaneous illegal foreign currency transactions through buying foreign currency from individuals and entities.
“It was also noted that some of the companies would engage transactions which are not related to their line of business. Some would also purchase fast moving consumer goods from various manufacturers and the goods would then be sold exclusively in foreign currency,” he said.
Minister Ncube highlighted that the Government has therefore blacklisted the nineteen companies and the Procurement Regulatory Authority (PRAZ) would be advised accordingly, to blacklist these entities from doing business with Government.
The nineteen companies blacklisted include, Paza Buster (Pvt) Ltd, The Legacy Car Rental (Pvt) Ltd, The Best Car Rental,Josam Enterprises (Pvt) Ltd, Construction Warehouse (Pvt) Ltd, Blackdeck (Pvt) Ltd among others.
The Government of Zimbabwe remains committed to maintaining macro-economic stability and the elimination of harmful and destabilizing arbitrage conditions that have pervaded the economy at the expense of the generality of citizens. The measures being implemented are in sync with the announcements by President Emmerson Mnangagwa on 7 May 2022 which managed to instill discipline and curb speculative behavior.
