Bikita Minerals constructs clinic for community

BIKITA Minerals has partnered Bikita Rural District Council in the construction of a clinic in Marozva communal lands to bring health services closer to the people.

The new Domboshava health facility is expected to reduce the distance travelled by villagers in some parts of Marozva, who are walking distances of up to 20 kilometres to access health services.

Bikita RDC chief executive Mr Peter Chibi on Tuesday said his council decided to partner Bikita Minerals to complete the clinic whose construction started more than 25 years ago.

Mr Chibi said the lithium miner chipped in with additional funding after work on the project had stalled owing to financial constraints.

“We have come a long way with Bikita Minerals in terms of partnership on key infrastructural projects and we have a number of projects that the lithium miner is funding to improve living standards of people in our district,” he said.

“We are very excited about the construction of Domboshava Clinic where some villagers lost their lives or their loved ones after failing to access health facilities on time.”

Mr Chibi said his council was concerned with the high mortality rate of pregnant mothers in the district, a situation he attributed to dearth of health facilities.

Besides financing a large chunk of construction work at Domboshava Clinic, Bikita Minerals was also funding building of modern houses to attract skilled health personnel to the institution.

Bikita Minerals chief executive Mr Grant Huddson said his company responded by financing the construction of Domboshava Clinic after a distress call by Chief Marozva (Mr Philip Mudhe).

Mr Hudson said the clinic project was being done under the lithium miner’s community responsibility programme.

“We received a request for help to assist in the construction of a clinic from Chief Marozva and we approached Bikita RDC for us to partner in the project,” he said.