The job cuts resulted in 1,455 central bank employees -- representing 75 percent of the staff -- being laid off.

In a letter sent to the affected workers, bank chief Gideon Gono said he hoped the country would not slide back to the instability which spurred the country's economic crisis.

"Regrettably, you are one of the candidates identified for retrenchment by the governor so that the in line with the new Board's approved structure, the bank can focus on its core objectives," Gono said in a letter obtained by AFP.

"It is the bank's and my own prayer that the politics of the country will not, as happened over the last 10 years, go into a tailspin with disastrous and unintended consequences that will see us again being called to defending our country and cleaning up the mess that would inevitably follow," he said.

The move, costing the bank 70 million US dollars, follows recommendations that the central bank, which had undertaken various quasi-fiscal projects, revert to its core business.

Neither Gono nor his spokesman were immediately available to comment on the contents of the letter.

The affected workers will initially get 5,000 US dollars each in compensation, the state-run Herald reported.

The mass retrenchment will leave the bank with 493 workers out of 1,948.

Gono was widely blamed for presiding over rampant printing of Zimbabwe's local dollar which reached astronomical denominations until it was abandoned in 2009.

His post remains one of the major sticking points in the unity government between veteran President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.