FINANCE minister Patrick Chinamasa, on Wednesday, criticised South African banks for wanting to charge more when its neighbour approaches them for loans.
“Your financial institutions make it more expensive than when they lend to their own clients here,” he said after agreements were signed between the two countries at the Union Buildings in Pretoria.
“What is the justification for money going across the border being more expensive than when [in] Limpopo?” he asked journalists after  President Robert Mugabe and South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma had addressed the media on relations between the two countries.
“Why is it more expensive just crossing a river?” Chinamasa asked. “It’s like taking advantage of our situation . . .”
Asked whether he had come to South Africa to borrow money for the country, which has survived hyperinflation and had to stop using its own currency in favour of the US dollar, Chinamasa flatly denied it.
He explained that Zimbabwe had laid very large foundations for economic recovery and had recently started inter-bank lending again.Advertisement