The Central Bank of Swaziland

The Central Bank of Swaziland was established in 1974 under the following conditions:

 The King’s Order-in-Council cited as the Monetary Authority of Swaziland was enacted by the King in collaboration with the Council on 22nd March 1974 and date of official commencement on 1st April 1974.
 An amendment of the Order-in-Council was made on the 18th July 1979 for commencement on 20th July 1979 by replacing the previous Monetary Authority with Central Bank of Swaziland.

There is no specific law guaranteeing independance. Functionally, the bank falls under the Ministry of Finance, but has its own structure which is independent of government, as well as a minority government representation (by Principal Secretary, Ministry of Finance) in the Bank’s Board of Directors. Also, in its execution of duties the bank operates independently as a parastatal organisation, Clause 3(2) of the Monetary Authority Order gives the bank Statutory powers; recommendation and clearance of the Finance Minister on such policies as exchange rate and staff salaries is however sought before implementation.

For quite some time now, Swaziland has maintained the same mix of banks in the Kingdom. What has changed over the years is ownership and hence the trade name. At the end of March 2004, there were three commercial banks, one development bank and one building society in the country.

Tuesday 25 October 2005