Another knock is coming for MultiChoice Zimbabwe as the remaining DStv and GOtv subscribers in the Southern African country are now forced to pay for their monthly subscription fees in the new Zimbabwean dollar as the only allowed currency.
MultiChoice that just released its first set of financial year results last week as The MultiChoice Group after the pan-African pay-TV operator was spun off from the bigger Naspers group, last week singled out Zimbabwe, together with Angola as the two countries with the biggest currency problems impacting negatively on the broader MultiChoice Africa division's revenue on the continent.
On Monday the economically-destroyed Zimbabwe that is facing a worsening economic crisis as it struggles with rampant inflation and other macro-economic problems, suddenly announced that it's switching to the "new" Zimbabwean dollar, more than a decade after it became worthless.
Mthuli Ncube, Zimbabwe's minister of finance, announced on Monday that the American dollar, South Africa's rand, the British pound and Botswana's pula will no longer be accepted as legal tender in Zimbabwe with only the Zimbabwe dollar that can be used as payment for local transactions.
Currencies like the rand and the dollar have been used as payment in Zimbabwe since 2009.
"The Zimbabwe dollar shall, with effect from 24 June 2019 be the sole legal tender in Zimbabwe in all transactions," the Zimbabwe government gazetted.
This will now make it even more difficult for DStv and GOtv subscribers in Zimbabwe to pay MultiChoice Zimbabwe for a pay-TV service.
Zimbabwe's bad currency and foreign currency crisis steadily worsened during the past two years, with it becoming almost impossible for DStv subscribers in the country to make payments.
In January MultiChoice Zimbabwe told DStv subscribers to pay their accounts in rand from South Africa.
In February 2017 the Zimbabwe Reserve Bank dramatically ramped up its clamping down on citizens using foreign currency and the American dollar, specifically slamming Zimbabwean DStv subscribers for their "illogical behaviour" of wanting to subscribe and pay for DStv.
Since late-2016 several payment options for DStv subscribers in Zimbabwe simply disappeared with payment processing providers announcing that they simply can't continue to process DStv payments.
