New chrome organisation formed

Lovemore Zigara Midlands Correspondent
CHROME miners have formed a lobby group under the banner – the Confederation of Zimbabwe Small Scale Chrome Miners (CZSSCM) – to represent the interests of the over registered sub-sector. The new body, which is affiliated to the Zimbabwe Miners’ Federation (ZMF), has elected new office bearers and will be led by Fred Ncube, who is its president.

Ncube is also vice president of ZMF and will be deputised by Simon Sigauke.

Others members of the executive are Anthony Msipa, the secretary, Peter Mahwendu — in charge of the association’s purse while Fred Chamboko and Shepherd Masasi will head the technical teams.

Philip Moyo and Isaac Chivendera will be in charge of publicity while Bridget Chombe and Owen Mubobo represent the youths. Jean Butete is in charge of logistics.

Moyo said the association has registered 700 members and its first port of call would be to seek for a review of chrome prices to between $80 and $100.

“Previously small scale mining has always been interpreted to cover gold and yet Zimbabwe, being the second largest producer of chrome ore, has seen little attention being paid to the chrome sector by government. The formation of CZSSCM will go a long way in addressing this anomaly,” he said.

“As part of our mandate we will try to harmonise chrome pricing with the Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe. We will lobby government to come up with a uniform price for chrome. We’re seeking an upward review of between $80 to $100 per tonne, which isn’t much given the prevailing market price.”

Chrome is currently fetching between $30 to $45 a tonne.

Moyo said the lobby body would seek to ensure that there is equitable distribution of machinery and equipment sourced by government especially with regards to the $100 million facility from the Chinese Development Bank.