The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has completed the integration of the national Civil Registry database with mobile money subscriber records, a change that means every mobile wallet in the country should now be traceable to a verified national identity document.

RBZ Governor Dr John Mushayavanhu, responding to questions from The Herald, said the central bank had directed all mobile money operators to complete a customer verification exercise and submit proof of compliance by 30 June 2026. “All operators have since met this requirement and provided the necessary documentation,” he said.

He added that all mobile money wallets had been rescreened in collaboration with the Civil Registry and that the follow-up verification was “successfully concluded by 30 June 2026 with no adverse issues noted during the exercise”. Providers have since been connected to the Civil Registry system so identities can be checked when accounts are opened and during routine know-your-customer reviews.

The directive originated in the central bank’s February 2026 Monetary Policy Statement, which ordered operators to de-register any account that could not be matched to a valid national identification document. The Reserve Bank had warned that duplicated identities, ghost lines and mismatched subscriber details were a systemic risk capable of enabling fraud, identity manipulation and illicit financial flows.

Business Times reported that the exercise has resulted in ghost, fictitious and duplicate wallets being shut down, describing it as a major clean-up of the country’s digital payments ecosystem.

Operators had already been working under a 2021 directive enforcing a strict “one line, one wallet” policy limiting each SIM card to a single mobile money account. Inconsistencies in subscriber databases nonetheless persisted, and it is those gaps the latest measures are designed to close.

For Zimbabweans abroad the practical effect is straightforward. Mobile wallets are one of the main landing points for money sent home, and a wallet that cannot be matched to a valid ID is no longer a wallet. Relatives receiving remittances need their registration details to match the records held by the Civil Registry — and anyone whose account was opened years ago on loose paperwork may find it has been closed.

Sources: The Herald; Business Times.

Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, has announced the formation of a new artificial intelligence startup called xAI. The company comprises engineers who have previously worked at companies like OpenAI and Google. Musk has previously expressed his belief that AI development should be paused and regulated.

The aim of xAI is to “understand reality” and “the true nature of the universe,” although its specific objectives and funding are currently unknown. The company will host a Twitter Spaces chat on Friday that may reveal more details. Musk was an original backer of OpenAI, but his relationship with the company has deteriorated due to his criticisms of their language model, ChatGPT, for having a liberal bias and its relationship with Microsoft.

He has also signed an open letter calling for a pause to “Giant AI Experiments” and has expressed concerns about AI safety and the data used to train chatbots. Musk purchased Twitter and made significant changes, leading to some high-profile departures from the platform.

ECOCASH has launched a digital mobile phone-based bureau de change in a move set to increase competition in the foreign currency exchange business.

The innovative facility, a first by a mobile money service provider, will likely revolutionise the business by providing the much-needed convenience to the platform’s 10 million registered customers.

According to the company, the new service will allow EcoCash customers to sell foreign currency in real-time and instantly have the local currency converted and credited to their wallets.

The move follows the granting of an operating licence to EcoCash by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, which has an effect of increasing access to specialised digital financial services to millions of Zimbabweans.

Speaking at the launch of the service in Harare yesterday, EcoCash chief executive officer, Ms Natalie Jabangwe, explained how the service would work.

“Before performing a currency conversion transaction, one needs to fund their EcoCash wallet,” she said, adding that a wallet could be funded in a number of ways.

“You fund your wallet by doing a cash-in of physical US dollars (or forex) into the wallet. Or you fund your wallet over the counter, at any Econet Shop. You can also fund your wallet through a direct in-wallet receipt of remittances from the diaspora into your EcoCash wallet. This could be through existing EcoCash remittance partners, which include Cassava Remit, World Remit, Mukuru, Western Union, Money Gram, Orange Botswana and MTN.”
Ms Jabangwe said an EcoCash customer could also fund their wallet via a Nostro bank-to-wallet transfer on their phone, from their respective FCA bank account linked to the EcoCash FCA wallet. She said once the wallet was funded, a customer could then proceed to dial a dedicated EcoCash Bureau de Change menu on the access code *150# to carry out their transaction.

“Customers will be able to check the rate of the day, get a quote for the amount to be sold and receive instant ‘confirmation of sale’ of foreign currency and the ZW$ conversation amount – all this happening via their mobile phone,” Ms Jabangwe said.

Cassava Smartech CEO, Mr Eddie Chibi, the parent company of EcoCash, said: “We are excited to be the first and only mobile financial service provider in Africa to offer this innovative service to our customers, empowering them with a simple, convenient, fast and real-time Bureau de Change service that they can access and use to transact anywhere, anytime.”

He said the service will help customers access competitive exchange rates quickly, convert or change their money in real-time, and transact on a secure platform that they have come to trust.

Ms Jabangwe said EcoCash Zimbabwe continued to leverage on the dynamic innovation capabilities that technology gives by building new products and services that go beyond the early services of financial inclusion.

“The advantage of having a scaled transaction platform is that you can build new services in line with a changing market environment. Accessibility of these services on the mobile phone enables us to travel the journey with our customers towards more complex but necessary financial services in the future,” she said. The Chronicle