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Harare - Disgruntled depositors with AfrAsia Bank's unit in Zimbabwe have written to the Zimbabwe Republic Police seeking clearance to stage a strike against the bank's failure to meet their cash demands.
The bank has imposed a $20 per day withdrawal limit and is reportedly closing down some of its out-of-town branches. Bank officials were not immediately reachable for comment on Wednesday.
“We have tried to hold discussions with management of the bank and they say they are facing problems which are known to the central bank,” said one of the disgruntled depositors, who is coordinating the strike planned for February 17 at the bank’s head office in Harare.
In a letter dated February 10 addressed to the officer commanding Harare and under the heading 'Application for police clearance to stage a demo against AfrAsia Bank', depositors outline the problems they are encountering as a result of the bank’s failure to meet demands for cash.
They say they have been prejudiced through “failure to pay school fees for their dependants” and evictions “from leased houses” because they cannot access the money held on deposit with AfrAsia Bank Zimbabwe.
Additionally, the depositors add in their letter that their woes have been worsened by the bank’s management who are "ill-treating" them.
“We want to march against the respondent... the short-changed clients (of the bank) will be having placards depicting the various grievances arising from the bank’s failure to avail our monies when requested due to erratic cash disbursements from the bank.”
AfrAsia Bank is one of the banks the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has said it is monitoring for potential instability. The central bank is due to issue a monetary policy statement expected to address stability in the industry later on Wednesday.
Zimbabwe’s banking industry has been beset by instability in the past few years, with locally owned banks the most affected. Genesis Bank, Trust Bank and Royal Bank have all collapsed in the past two years while Tetrad Bank and Allied Bank - owned by Transport Minister Obert Mpofu - have now also had their licences cancelled.
Delayed results for the year to end-June this month showed AfrAsia Zimbabwe in the red after sustaining a US$9m loss.
AfrAsia group chairperson Arnaud Lagesse said in January that “entities of the group (AfrAsia) will be split between a banking cluster and a non-banking cluster, and within the banking cluster, the Zimbabwe entities will cease to be subsidiaries of the bank and will be held separately”.
This was being done to ensure that the risks of Zimbabwe are ringfenced and do not affect mainstream operations on the AfrAsia Bank balance sheet, he added.
