Traditional leaders, war vets granted mining rights

GOVERNMENT has granted mining rights to selected traditional leaders and war veterans across the country as it works towards meeting the Second Republic’s national development goals of attaining an upper middle-income economy by year 2030.

The country has set an ambitious target of a US$12 billion mining industry by the end of this year.

The sector is one of the county’s top economic drivers and has recoded major milestones in different sub-mineral segments since the coming in of the New Dispensation.

The granting of mining rights is in line with the April 2021 Government decision to ban the export of raw chrome.

Chrome mineralisation occurs mainly in two forms namely: lumpy ores, which are fed straight into furnaces and alluvial ores, such as sand and are upgraded into higher value sand for feeding into furnaces referred to as chrome concentrates.

In a post-Cabinet media briefing yesterday, Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Minister, Senator Monica Mutsvangwa, said with the technology in use on most of the furnaces in the country, a limit has been set to minimise the use of mineral ore in furnaces while broadening participation of local communities.

“Following the boom in the mining sector, the Government has seen fit to broaden participation of communities in the sector. To that end, Cabinet wishes to advise the nation that it granted the request by the following traditional leaders to acquire mining titles in reserved areas for the benefit of their communities,: “Tefra Mining Syndicate (Chief Marange); Goromonzi Mining Trust (Three Chiefs Rusike, Chinamora, Chikwaka); Chinamhora Mining Syndicate (Chief Chinamhora); Chiwara Mining Syndicate (Chief Chiwara); Bere SP Mining Syndicate (Chief Bere) and Budiriro Mining Syndicate (Chief Chiweshe).”

Minister Mutsvangwa said Cabinet further granted the request by war veterans to be awarded mining titles for the betterment of their livelihoods.

Similarly, Government has approved applications to approve technical anomalies in some mining syndicates that have since created massive job opportunities.

“Cabinet has approved a proposal through which part of the Mashava Reservations held by the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development will be allocated to eleven syndicates,” said Minister Mutsvangwa.

She said the syndicates will be from each of the eight administrative districts of Masvingo Province with three other syndicates being solely for youth, war veterans and women to supply chrome ores to Zimbabwe Zhongxin Smelting Company (ZZSC).

“The company is a new ferrochrome smelting project based in Mashava, Masvingo province with capacity to generate about US$88 million and create 200 jobs locally. The rationale for banning the export of ores and concentrates was for companies to invest in the requisite facilities to value-add to ferrochrome. This policy still stands and companies have started the process of constructing smelting furnaces,” said Senator Mutsvangwa.

She said to enable the companies to raise the necessary capital, the Cabinet has approved recommendations by the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development for the exemption on the ban of export of chrome ores by the concerned companies in order to complete the construction and expansion of furnaces and processing facilities.

Minister Mutsvangwa said the mining rights had been granted following due considerations following the ban of export of lumpy chrome ores.