The Sunday Mail
Government should resuscitate the Economic Crimes Court to deal with commercial crimes like foreign currency externalisation and illegal mineral trade, Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Dr John Mangudya has said.
Zimbabwe, he said, has not been spared illegal economic activity, with companies and individuals externalising close to US$2 billion under various guises in 2015.
US$1,2 billion was externalised by corporates and the remainder by individuals.
Though law enforcement intercept suspects, such crimes largely go through the justice system slowly as they require specialised treatment.
In 2013, mining companies earned US$2 billion from exports but remitted just US$50 million to Treasury instead of at least US$300 million.
Mining accounts for 65 percent of Zimbabwe’s export earnings.
However, only three percent of this is banked locally and the remainder goes to offshore accounts.
According to a Global Financial Integrity report on illicit financial flows from Africa, Zimbabwe lost US$12 billion since Independence through tax evasion and money laundering.
At a high-level meeting on Tackling Illicit Financial Flows and Inequality in Africa in Nigeria in May 2014, former South African President Mr Thabo Mbeki said African countries lose between US$50 billion and US$60 billion annually through illicit financial flows.
In the last 30 years, the continent could have lost more than US$1,4 trillion.
“There is urgent and compelling need for Government to resuscitate an Economic Crimes Court in order to ensure that the plugging-the-leakages approach advocated in this Monetary Policy Statement is legally supported,” said Dr Mangudya in his 2016 Monetary Policy Statement.
“The investigation and prosecution of crimes involving strategic minerals like gold and diamonds, for example, necessitates the seizure by the State of the recovered minerals which are then kept as exhibits to be used in the trial.
“The current congestion in the criminal resolution system results in protracted processes before finalisation of economic crime cases. During this process, the country lacks access to the resources which could be generated from the liquidation of the looted products or exhibits.”
He added: “Economic crime cases dealing with minerals would thus be removed from the long queue of cases in the normal courts dealt with in the special courts created for that purpose.
“The ECC will reduce the time frames within which minerals are held unproductively as exhibits in the justice system, all for the benefit of the nation.
“Our conviction and optimism is that the country is at a critical juncture that requires a deeper sense of responsibility, accountability and transparency by all stakeholders for economic development and transformation.” MBCA Bank MD Dr Charity Jinya commended Dr Mangudya’s stance.
“The economy has been losing currency through imports at a time when exports are half of our imports. His measures will ensure we retain our resources in the country, which should contribute to further development of this economy at a time when we have very high unemployment rate.”
