Zimbabwe to pay Botswana fuel debt

Zimbabwe to pay Botswana fuel debt

ZIMBABWE has suffered cronic fuel shortages over the past two years

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By Agencies

ZIMBABWE is to repay the 20 million-litre fuel loaned to it by Botswana in 2000 by depositing money into a Botswana government account, ministry of foreign affairs and international co-operation clarified today.

We reported on Monday that the Botswana Auditor General was seeking clarification over the writing-off of Zimbabwe's debt. But the Botswana foreign affairs ministry, in a press release, said the debt had not been cancelled.

"Infact, just recently, the government of Zimbabwe requested through the Botswana Embassy in Harare, that it be provided with a government of Botswana account where the money to repay the debt would be deposited.

The government account number has accordingly been provided and we await the deposit to be made soon," explains the release.

The New Zimbabwe.com story was quoting the latest Auditor General Seletlanyo Seerema's report, which states that the debt worth over P28 million has been "indirectly written off".

Serema told BOPA that Foreign Affairs and International Co-operation said it had settled the debt by crediting the National Petroleum Fund from which the loan was drawn.

However, the ministry's statements states that it has not written off, either directly or indirectly, the debt in question.

"It is correct that the Ministry used funds in its recurrent budget to pay off the Petroleum Fund, but the debiting of the recurrent expenditure vote did not in anyway mean that the debt should be removed from the books of account." BOPA
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