MPs take Chinamasa to task over bond notes bill public hearings

Members of Parliament, mostly from the MDC-T, took Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa to task over public hearings concerning the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Ammendment Bill public hearings and wanted to know why the Government introduced bond notes at a time when parliament’s portfolio committee on Budget and Finance was seeking people’s views on the bill.

Mutare Central MP Innocent Gonese (MDC-T) said the views of the people would be made redundant as it was already a Government had already accomplished what the bill will legalise if passed into law. Mabvuku-Tafara MP James Maridadi (MDC-T) said the consultations being made countrywide by the committee were a “dead rubber” since the bond notes were already in circulation. Gutu Central MP, Lovemore Matuke (Zanu-PF) said his assessment had shown that the bond notes had not done enough to end queues.

In response Chinamasa said that the bill was introduced as a cautionary measure as there was already existing legislation to support the decision to bring on board the surrogate currency. Responding to the issue on continued bank queues, Chinamasa said that the central bank had issued $12 million into the market and would consider increasing it in a manner that was not inflationary.