Cassava Drags RBZ To Court Over Directive To Stop Ecocash Transactions

Cassava Smartech Zimbabwe Limited has today filed to the High Court against the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) suspension of mobile money cash in and cash out.

Mzokithula Mbuyisa, a legal practitioner representing Cassava says although the Central bank is targeting the users who abuse the system, the Directive is indiscriminate and will affect millions of innocent people.

“My view is that the directive is ultra-vires Section 10 of the National Payment Systems Act [Chapter 24: 23]in that that section empowers the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to only act against the acts or omissions of a system or of the management board of the system, yet in the present case, the abuse complained about is attributable to some customers of the Applicant, and not to the system of the Applicant or the management Board of the Applicant,” Mbuyisa said.

“In any event, the Responded’s (RBZ) decision is irrational in that it seeks to penalise even the innocent users of the applicant’s system instead of identifying the abusers and dealing with them on a basis as Respondent has done before.”

Cassava Smartech, Chief Executive Officer, Edmore Chibi, in his founding affidavit said pulling down cash in and cash out facilities could result in loss of life.

“The cash in and cash out facilities are core to the Ecocash System. Inorder to pull these facilities down, the whole Ecocash platform has had to be pulled down first,” Chibi explained. “Now this, platform handles 7 million transactions per day by approximately 2 million people.”

“Some of these transactions are done to deal with life saving situations.”

“Pulling down Ecocash could thus mean loss of life, loss of opportunities that could save livelihoods, and financial loss running into hundreds of millions if not billions.”

RBZ, yesterday, directed mobile payment system providers to discontinue cash in and cash out due to abuse of the facilities by economic agents.

The central bank said the buying and selling of cash through mobile money agents at high rates above the approved charges of cash in and cash out are compromising the public interest objectives of national payment systems in the economy.