‘STOP GOLD LOOTING’

…Green Party decries gold smuggling by foreigners

POLICYfailures in the mining sector are causing foreigners to loot Zambia’s gold and the externalisation of colossal sums of money, Green Party President Peter Sinkamba has said.

Mr Sinkamba said management of mineral resources had been very poor in the past years as only foreigners were enjoying the real benefits .

He said in an interview that Zambians and Government were not benefitting enough from the mineral resources which were enriching foreigners and the countries they came from.

Mr Sinkamba said in 2015 foreigners benefitted over US$6 billion from mining of which Government only collected about US$300 million in taxes.

He said the situation was the same even now because of policy failures that prioritised foreigners at the expense of locals. Mr Sinkamba observed that Government had been paying at ‘lip service’ with regards to policy pronouncements.

He said that policy failures were now leading to foreigners taking advantage of gold which was supposed to benefit locals. Mr Sinkamba said unless policy was coupled with action, there would be no real benefits from the newly discovered gold to Zambians.

“The problem we have at the moment is failure with regards to policy, there is too much talking but no action. Even these foreigners who are taking advantage of our gold would have been dealt with a long time,” he said.

Recently, Mines and Mineral Development Minister, Richard Musukwa, complained that much of the gold was being smuggled out by foreigners.

Mining experts have called on Government to come up with a “Marshall Plan” on gold mining to ensure the resource benefit locals.