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NIEEB regional offices are expected to be set up throughout the country by mid-year following the establishment of the board’s head office in Harare in 2010.
“We have started short-listing candidates for people to run our regional offices and depending on the availability of resources, we expect to launch and commission the offices by mid-year,” said NIEEB chairperson Mr David Chapfika in a telephone interview from Harare.
He said one of the major issues impacting negatively on NIEEB activities was inadequate funding from the fiscus.
“One of the major drawbacks facing NIEEB is shortage of resources to support our activities. We have not received funding from the National Budget to support our activities. However, despite such challenges we are trying to be innovative to make sure that we set up the offices by mid-year,” he said.
The regional offices were initially targeted to be established countrywide before the end of 2010.
Mr Chapfika would not be drawn into revealing the amount that was needed to set up the regional offices citing professional reasons.
NIEEB was set up by Government to work on modalities to operationalise the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment programme.
As part of fulfilling its mandate, the board last year launched trusts such as the Community Share Ownership Scheme as well as Management Share Ownership Scheme to ensure broad-based economic empowerment of indigenous Zimbabweans.
The Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act is meant to address economic disparities and imbalances that existed in shareholding structures of most foreign firms operating in Zimbabwe.
Under the Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act, foreign-owned entities with a minimum turnover of $500 000 are required to cede 51 percent of their shares to locals.
Online Reporter