adminEssar last year pledged to provide $5 million towards an SMEs development fund and another $5 million towards a women and youth fund when Government sold 56 percent of its stake in Zisco to it.
However, the pledge has been in limbo as Government and the Indian company haggled over the shareholding structure of the deal and ownership of lucrative iron ore reserves.
Cabinet has since decided that the deal be implemented in its original form, removing obstacles preventing Essar from resuming operations at Zisco.
In an interview yesterday, the Minister of SMEs and Cooperative Development Sithembiso Nyoni said now that the deal has been cleared, her ministry was also going to make follow-ups on the pledge.
She said although the money was not enough to take care of all challenges affecting SMEs, it was going to help.
“It has been quiet for a while now since the Government and the company had a deadlock over some issues but we are grateful they were resolved which means we will start making plans of following up the fund.
“The money is not enough, taking into consideration problems affecting the industry but we are hopeful it will go a long way in assisting operations,” said Minister Nyoni.
She also said once they know how the fund would be allocated they would sit down as a ministry and other interested parties to see how they could use the money.
Minister Nyoni said the needs of SMEs were just too many and the fund was going to help address some of those needs.
“We are yet to find out how the fund would be allocated and from there we will sit down as the ministry and other interested parties to see how best we can use the money. The needs are just too plenty but using the fund, we may be able to address some of them,” said the minister.
Online Reporter