LILONGWE-(MaraviPost)-The Reserve bank of Malawi ( RBM) says is following up leads that the dealers are printing the Malawi Kwacha in neighbouring Zambia and Tanzania and infiltrating the fake notes into the country as liquidity system.
The development is threat to the country’s economy in that the local unit may lose authenticity, reduce value of real money, destabilise inflation and reduce acceptance of paper money.
The deputy governor responsible for bank supervision, Grant Kabango said that the bank has a number of leads that are taking them to those jurisdictions.
Kabango added, “These people include people who are caught with counterfeit notes and they are following up on who supplied them and that takes them through to the manufacturers”.
Chikumbutso Kalilombe, Economic Association of Malawi (ECAMA) president said that the problem could cause transaction woes and also costs of printing replacement currency.
Last month two men we’re arrested in Dowa district for being found in possession of fake MK1,000 notes amounting to MK140,000.
The central bank prosecuted and won in court 28 cases involving illegal foreign exchange externalisation , transfer pricing and counterfeit currency equivalent to MK587.7 million was forfeited to the Malawi government.
In 2018 RBM recorded 1757 pieces of counterfeit notes.