The Sunday Mail
IT is so disheartening to note how we (Zimbabweans) are being taken for a ride by some of these so-called investors who come into our country pretending as if they have lots of money and yet they want to steal or spy on us.
Advice to my fellow Zimbabweans: As a consultant, I have met a fair share of these and I will tell you how you can tell if an investor is genuine or not.
To start with, it is advisable to suspect an investor who only insists on having conversations over emails and over the phone, whilst showing no interest whatsoever of visiting the country. Most often such investors are wasting your time. A genuine partner would want to get an understanding and a thorough due diligence on where he wants to put his money.
Secondly, if you hear of anyone stating very large sums of money like US$300 million, then chances that the person is fake are high. Such people can even avail proof of funding from their foreign banks and make everything look authentic and real.
If you are to ask such people to put that money in Zimbabwe, they will actually tell you that they are not confident with the Zimbabwean system and if it does not go well, it will take time to get their money back. Ask those very people why they still want to invest in Zimbabwe in such circumstances. Some of these tricksters might even appear so genuine that they will ask the victim to pay a commitment deposit fee of, say, about US$5 million from profitable entities in return for the US$300 million loan facility.
Because of technology, one can easily set up a fake company online and a website to make it look real. Others even go to great lengths of setting up an office with landlines, but once you pay the deposit fee of US$5 million, the company will simply melt into oblivion; you will never be able to track these so-called investors.
These stories are happening and they are very real. Thirdly, if one is saying he or she is an “agent from South Africa”, you have every reason to suspect them. Most of these people will be crooks or even spies trying to find ways to manipulate our system.
Noticeably, most of these corn artists are usually white ladies in their 50s. Forgive me if I appear to be racially profiling, but this is what is happening.
Often because of historically nurtured prejudices and stereotypes, it is difficult not to trust such a person. You should throw caution to the wind and believe them only when you see the colour of their money.
Either by default or by design most of these predatory individuals usually use gmail accounts for their communications.
The fourth and critical one is a person who says “I am working for a certain big fish in this country”, masquerading as proxies of very influential and important personalities.
You must be on the lookout for such cunning people. They are obviously using the names of our leaders in vain.
How can you do business with someone you do not know? There are many such people now around Zimbabwe who are just after stealing people’s money. For example, for one to be a registered diamond buyer in Zimbabwe there is no money paid to MMCZ and the process is both straightforward and free.
A lot of people, however, have lost their money through these crooks that are tarnishing the image of our country.
Real investors will surely respect the policies and procedures of our country. If one wants shortcuts, then he is not a good business partner. Wikipedia describes due diligence as a term used for a number of concepts, involving either an investigation of a business or person prior to signing a contract, or an act with a certain standard of care.
It is better to engage professionals and even cater for their flight fares for them to make sure that the individual or entity to be dealt with is surely genuine and real.
For someone intending to invest large sums of money, their balance sheet should be also supported with a very strong asset base and minimum liabilities.
Those ratios – often learnt in college – are very vital and I fail to understand why we choose to ignore them in practical situations. To sum the above, it is better to lose a few dollars by doing a thorough due diligence than to lose millions of dollars due to recklessness and excitement.
Taurai Changwa is an Articled Accountant in Zimbabwe and ACCA finalist. He is the managing director of SAFIC Consultancy and can be reached on [email protected]
