By Letwin Nyambayo
BULAWAYO – Hard times have befallen AfrAsia Bank Bulawayo branch as clients can only access a paltry $50 daily.
This comes as the bank, recently re-branded from Kingdom Bank following a 62,5 percent share takeover by AfrAsia Bank Mauritius (ABM), is also making frantic efforts to raise $100 million in fresh capital.
Depositors are spending hours queuing to get cash.
When the Daily News crew visited the bank, clients were sitting on the pavements and some had blankets, saying they had resorted to sleeping at the bank.
Clients who spoke to the Daily News expressed their anger over this saying that it was a huge inconvenience.
Tonderai Moyo said he could no longer take care of himself.
“What is happening is unfair to customers,” Moyo said. “It has been three weeks since I got my salary but I just managed to withdraw less than a quarter.
“It is very painful because I need to pay my rentals, buy food and do other important things. I am surviving on handouts whilst I am employed, fully knowing that my salary was deposited in the bank, but I cannot access it.
“The question is where my money is, it cannot just disappear. I am asking the government to intervene because we have suffered a lot and there is no assurance that we will get our money.”
Another client Frank Maduma complained: “The situation is bad. It has affected us badly, we need our money, it is more like we are going back to the 2007 era and the bank management must do something about this because it is not fair. It is a huge inconvenience to us clients.”
Ezra Mukungwa said many people were now forced to sleep at the bank.
“I slept in the queue on Sunday only to get the money on Monday in the afternoon,” Mukungwa said.
After getting the $50, many clients are now forced to rejoin the queue to get more money.
AfrAsia recently admitted that it was suffering the effects of the prevailing acute liquidity crisis.
“…liquidity constraints in the local economy have affected our normal operations,” the bank’s spokesperson Sekai Chitemerere said.
“In an effort to ensure that all our clients have access to available cash, our branches have had to introduce intermittent daily withdrawal limits,” she said, adding that the institution was “working flat out to normalise the situation.” Daily News