The new Governor of the Reserve Bank, Gill Marcus, firmly refused on Thursday to allow the Bank to involve itself in trying to fix the external value of the rand.

"There is not a rate that is a perfect rate," she told MPs at a meeting of Parliamentary committees of finance and appropriations. "It is not the bank's task or desire to intervene to find an appropriate rate … It is not the bank's task to intervene in the market to achieve a particular rate of exchange. We do not do that and we will not do that."

She told the committees that the market sets the rate, although she agreed that there are implications in having a strong rand and there are implications for the repo rate. But she insisted: "If you want to intervene people will take you on. That is the lesson of the world. And therefore we do not look at a particular rate, we do not intervene to achieve a particular rate."

'We want a more stable currency'

The Governor, who told MPs when one of them raised the question that the female of 'Governor' has an entirely different meaning, said that the Bank does appear in the markets, but only to build up its reserves, or to find resources for a particular government project.

"Building reserves is costly," she said.

She did agree that the currency is volatile, and that there is no question that a volatile currency has an impact. "It has an impact on forward-looking, long-term decisions," she said. "So yes, we want a more stable currency."

Despite all this, Marcus said that the mandate of the bank is up for discussion. She said she would be happy to have such discussions with Parliamentarians. She has already had a discussion about this with the Minister of Finance, Pravin Gordhan.

"From the Reserve Bank side, the fact that there is concern and a requirement or request to discuss the mandate is something that we would be very willing to engage with people," she said, "to understand the concerns; to listen to what people are concerned about."

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