Kennedy Tsambo's faith in Zimbabwe's banking system finally hit breaking point over Christmas when he spent an ultimately fruitless three days queuing to withdraw cash in order to buy a bus fare home.
"This was not a donation that I was queuing for, it's my own money which I should be able to withdraw as and when I like," said the 37-year-old, who works as a mechanic in Harare but whose family lives in eastern Nyanyadzi district.
"Now I am thinking of taking out all my money. I won't deposit any more in the bank until this chaos is over."
Tsambo is among tens of thousands of casualties of a cash crisis in inflation-ravaged Zimbabwe which has seen banks regularly run out of notes since mid-October.
Central bank chief Gideon Gono blames the crisis on cash barons he says have been hoarding Zimbabwe dollars and exchanging them for scarce foreign currency.
Despite unveiling three new currency denominations last month in a bid to ease the shortages, winding queues are still a common feature at banks as the cash crisis persists.
Mairos Chigwada, an upholsterer who is self-employed, vowed he would "never repeat that mistake again" after depositing all the money he had earned during the peak month of November into his bank account.
"Now I can't withdraw the money," says Chigwada standing near the tail-end of a queue outside a bank in Harare's Samora Machel Avenue.
"It's just not fair. It's hard enough working for that money and it shouldn't be another pain taking it out of the bank where I put it in the first place."
With the cash crisis showing no sign of abating, many Zimbabweans are losing faith in the banking system, according to analysts, and could revert to the old days of stashing vast sums of money in pillow cases.
"Nobody in their sense would sell their goat, for example, and take the money to the bank when they are not sure they can withdraw it when they want it," Daniel Ndlela, an independent economist, said.
Godfrey Kanyenze, chief economist of the Zimbabwe Congress said depositors had no incentive to keep money in the bank.
"There is no incentive of keeping money in the bank any more," Kanyenze said.
"There is a crisis, everything is now collapsing on its face. Ultimately, this is a national problem," he said.
A banking executive painted a gloomy picture of the sector, predicting massive withdrawals while potential depositors stashed their earnings at home.
"The sector is bound to face serious problems when it comes to deposits," the executive said on condition of anonymity.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS