Zimbabwe’s new Finance Minister on Monday said he will focus on accelerating the country’s plan to pay arrears to the World Bank and African Development Bank (AfDB)
Mthuli Ncube said he would come up with a three-year programme to bring down government expenditure.
The 55-year-old was appointed to the position by President Emmerson Mnangagwa on Friday 7 September, and is expected to oversee Zimbabwe’s quest to rebuild its economy hit by lack of foreign investment, unemployment above 80 percent and acute dollar shortages.
Ncube told a press briefing that clearing $1.8 billion in arrears to the AfDB and the World Bank was important to his country’s economic recovery.
He also pledged to remove Zimbabwe’s quasi currency bond note as part of currency reforms.
Ncube is a former chief economist and vice president at the African Development Bank (AfDB) and was also a lecturer in finance at the London School of Economics and Wits Business School in South Africa.
