adminMcDowells International, All Angles Finance and Paramount Holdings had their money lending licences revoked earlier this year by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe for illegally engaging in banking business by taking deposits from the public without banking licences.
The deposits were reportedly used to further the personal interests of the company directors.
Following cancellation of their licences, the companies came up with repayment plans, which they are yet to honour.
McDowells International was the first to release the names of over 250 creditors who they were supposed to repay by the end of July but little progress appears to have been made so far.
The central bank, in a public notice in July, said McDowells International was set to refund $31 326 which they illegally deducted from clients’ accounts through the Salary Service Bureau stop order facility of 180 clients and $101 921 in depositors funds to 76 depositors bringing the total to $133 247.
All Angles Finance also released a list of 54 recipients who were to receive repayments of their deposits in excess of $38 000.
The two companies have since been convicted and fined $700 for contravening sections of the Banking Act. Sources among the depositors allege that McDowells claimed to have completed repaying the first batch of depositors saying it was working on repaying the second batch of depositors whose identities were not made public.
The sources said that there is no longer transparency in the manner in which the company was conducting repayments as it claims to have privately phoned those whose deposits it claims to be paying back.
The depositors met last Saturday at the former All Angles Complex, which has since been sold to Miles Coaches, a bus company.
The All Angles Finance is now operating from a single office at the complex. Depositors voiced concern at the delay in processing repayments.
Following the disappearance of the All Angles Finance owner, Mr Naison Nyachuru, soon after police and central bank probes into the activities of the moneylenders, depositors now fear the remaining workers might also disappear.
The depositors resolved to seek legal advice on the matter.
Online Reporter