Staff Reporter ZIMBABWE is likely to miss on the US$51 billion mobile money market in Africa due to the government’s repressive and harsh policies, analysts have said. Statistics from the GSMA show that Sub-Saharan Africa will remain the fastest growing region in terms of mobile money, with a CAGR of 4.6% and an additional 167 million subscribers over the period to 2025. This will take the total subscriber base to just over 600 million, representing around half the population. Apart from increasing access to financial services, the growing mobile money industry in Africa has offered a new career path and additional income opportunities to many small-scale entrepreneurs as mobile money agents. In addition, the global COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the need for mobile and digital technology on the continent. Several countries on the continent such as South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Nigeria and Ethiopia among others, are encouraging their citizens to use mobile money instead of cash, as a way combating the deadly coronavirus. However, economic analysts say the Government of Zimbabwe’s decision to ban mobile money agents, restrict bulk transactions and limit daily transactions will result in the country missing out on various opportunities presented by digital payment platforms. “The government is simply demonstrating beyond any reasonable doubt they are anti-business and don't understand how the modern economy operates. They are retrogressing towards a medieval economy,” said Professor Daniel Makina, an Economics lecturer with the University of South Africa. Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) Governor John Mangudya said a forensic audit conducted by the Central Bank to assess the integrity, compliance and efficacy of mobile money platforms and transactions in Zimbabwe revealed significant weaknesses in the systems of the mobile payment operators. “Concerted efforts are obviously required from all stakeholders to play their part in avoiding some of the vices which have been driving the parallel market exchange rate and propagating inflationary pressures in the economy,” he said, while presenting his Monetary Policy Statement last week. “These vices include the speculative and short-termism tendencies and indiscipline particularly relating to the use of the mobile money platforms which compelled government to take drastic measures to suspend agent-based mobile transactions and subsequent abolishment of agent mobile money wallet,” he said. Zimbabwe’s mobile money market is serviced by Ecocash, OneMoney, Telecash and My Cash, but Cassava Smartech – which was spun off from Econet – controls over 96% of the market through EcoCash. Former Economic Planning Minister Tapiwa Mashakada said the central bank’s assertion that Ecocash was fuelling foreign currency rates on the parallel market does not hold water. The government has since introduced a Dutch auction system to help tame illegal foreign currency trade in the country. “The major players now participating at the auction system are the same players who were yesterday a
