Tanzania keeps pressure on Acacia

ACACIA Mining’s terrible week continued yesterday after it revealed that one of its senior employees had been temporarily prevented from leaving Tanzania amid “increased levels of pressure from government agencies on Acacia employees in the past 48 hours”.

Shares in the Londonlisted gold miner, which has been hit by a ban on exports of gold concentrate from the East African nation since March, fell 2.3pc to close at 174.4p yesterday, taking its loss for the week to 33pc.

Acacia said the international staff member was detained at Dar es Salaam airport yesterday morning and his passport seized. Following legal intervention he was later released and his passport returned. It comes amid a bitter dispute be- tween Acacia and the Tanzanian government, which has accused the miner of underreporting exports of gold concentrate and, on Monday, said Acacia owed $190m (£145m) in taxes and penalties, which Acacia denies.

Barrick Gold, Acacia’s majority owner, is currently in talks with the government in an attempt to resolve the dispute.