Govt blocks ‘looting’ investor
THE Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe (MMCZ) has declined to renew a chrome export permit for leading chrome producer — African Chrome Fields (ACF) — after unearthing serious irregularities in the way the company was conducting business which bordered on looting, The Sunday Mail Business can exclusively reveal.
ACF is a joint venture between Sakunda Holdings and Johannesburg-based sub-Saharan conglomerate — Moti group — which has interests that straddle across mining, aviation, property development and transport.
The Moti group last year switched on an Aluminothermic Chrome processing Plant near Kwekwe and also signed a deal which would have seen the concern absorbing chrome produce by small-scale miners through a vehicle called the Zimbabwe Motivational Mining (ZMM).
However, over the last few days, the group’s senior executives have been quoted in some sections of the South African media as well as locally denouncing the new dispensation and Zimbabwe as an unattractive investment destination.
The group also announced that it was retrenching about 500 workers in a move that signals the beginning of the firm’s withdrawal from Zimbabwe.
Investigations by The Sunday Mail Business have, however, shown that contrary to the group’s assertion that the Zimbabwean unit was negatively affecting its overall performance, reality is that it was the local authorities that had pulled the plug.
In an interview on Friday, exclusive state minerals marketing arm, MMCZ, said it was “correcting the mess” surrounding ACF to ensure that the company doesn’t continue to “milk” the country of its resources.
“That’s correct,” said Mr Muzenda when asked if the marketer is handling a case involving suspected
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