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(TALKZIMBABWE) Biti defends Gono, blames media

Biti defends Gono, blames media
Our reporter
Thu, 09 Apr 2009 05:10:00 +0000

TENDAI BITI, the Minister of Finance has blamed the media for fabricating stories about the existence of 'bad blood' between him and the Reserve Bank Governor.

Biti who addressed a joint press briefing with Dr Gideon Gono, has made a U-turn on previous statements and said there was no 'bad blood' between him and the RBZ Governor.

"You cannot have a functional country in which the central bank governor and finance minister cannot work together," said Biti during the briefing.

"The problem is that there is a constant attempt to draw us into negativity," added Biti who once labelled the RBZ governor as an "economic terrorist" and called for his dismissal.

"This is what you guys in the media do to sell your papers. The Reserve Bank is a statutory body set up in terms of the RBZ Act while the Ministry of Finance is in charge of the exchequer so we can’t have an economy without fiscal and monetary policies working together," he said, echoing a statement made by the RBZ Governor when he addressed Parliament last week.

""There is a tendency in the media to draw us into the matrix of negatives when, in fact, the positives far outweigh the negative," he said.

"I think since the formation of this government, the negatives are in the minority. I will be the first to defend the gains of this government."

However Biti was quoted by many papers since he became minister saying the ouster of Dr. Gono was being negotiated.

He told Reuters international news agency that, “The Reserve Bank has totally discredited itself. We must accept that the Reserve Bank is at the core of economic decay.”

Biti also defended the statement he previously made to the media regarding the allocation of Mercedes Benz vehicles to cabinet ministers.

"In fact the cars on offer were not new but second-hand vehicles that had clocked up to 170 000km in mileage. These had been used under the central bank’s quasi-fiscal operations, which functions had now reverted back to the respective ministries."

Dr. Gono also responded to the reports in the media saying the the offer was in response to pleas by the MPs during last week’s meeting for them to use the vehicles as they awaited new ones from the Ministry of Finance.

This is in direct contrast to Biti's statement last week, in which he denied reports that his ministry had any input in the decision to allocate the vehicles.

He denied that the Finance Ministry had allocated some funds for new Mercedes Benzes for ministers and legislators.

Dr Gono revealed that it was Biti and the central bank board who instructed him to release the "idle used vehicles" to MPs.

"In fact, I was very explicit that the bank stood advised by the central bank board and the Minister of Finance on whether or not to field the idle used cars to honourable MPs," said Dr. Gono.

"This just goes to show how some of us are electing to be masters of sowing needless negativity among us through misreporting and radiation of issues out of context," he added.

Biti said the new inclusive Government needs about US$8.5 billion to fix the economy which has been hit by hyperinflation and 10 years of negative growth.

The new figure is US$1.5 billion less than that previously mentioned by Prime Minister Tsvangirai.

The new figure is also different from the one he appealed for when he presented his recovery plan, STERP in March.

Biti made a joint appeal with President Robert Mugabe for US$5 billion to revive the economy at the presentation of STERP.

Biti called for international financial institutions to lift sanctions against Zimbabwe and provide lines of credit.

He said the Bretton Woods twins, the IMF and World Bank had held positive talks with Zimbabwe, but expressed the urgency of opening up international lines of credit.

Biti said the response from the international community has "been positive, but we're still looking for international lines of credit."

Biti said some European countries had shown willingness to extend support to Zimbabwe.

"A few other countries that I don't have the mandate to disclose, and some banking institutions, some on the continent and some from Europe, have made an undertaking to extend lines of credit to the banking sector," Biti told a media briefing.

Western donors have withheld aid to Zimbabwe over policy differences with President Mugabe, and want to see political reforms put in place before resuming support.

Biti, who once opposed the dollarisation and 'Randification' of the Zimbabwean economy, said the government's decision to allow the use of multiple currencies for business transactions had brought price stability.

He added, however, that the economy faced liquidity problems due to a foreign currency crunch.

Biti, who is also the Secretary General of the former opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) party, said the inclusive Government had made significant progress since its formation in February.

"In the ... months that we've not been fighting each other, we've made phenomenal progress," he said.

Labels: GIDEON GONO, TENDAI BITI

posted by MrK @ 8:00 PM