TRAFIGURA INCREASES ITS ZIMBABWE STAKE TO 100%

COMMODITIES trader Trafigura will take control of its Zimbabwe business after buying out local partner Sakunda Holdings, which is owned by a businessperson close to President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government. Trafigura will increase its stake in Trafigura Zimbabwe to 100 percent, from 49 percent. The rest was owned by businessperson Kudakwashe Tagwirei’s unlisted Sakunda, which also operated Trafigura’s Puma Energy fuel outlets. The global commodities trader said in a statement late on Tuesday that it had signed an agreement with Sakunda in December to take full control of the Zimbabwean business after buying Sakunda’s shares. Trafigura did not say how much it had paid for the stake, but said the deal was awaiting final regulatory approval. “This will bring improved clarity on Trafigura’s activities in the country, an opportunity for more robust financing of Trafigura Zimbabwe, and (it) aims to help improve the security of supply of fuel to Zimbabwe,” Trafigura said. Zimbabwe is gripped by acute shortages of fuel and foreign currency as the economy grapples with its worst crisis in a decade. Tagwirei did not immediately respond to a request for comment while Sakunda’s chief operations officer Mberikwazvo Chitambo could not be reached for comment. The businessperson sits in Mnangagwa’s advisory council while his Sakunda company is a major financier of the government’s agriculture programme. | Reuters

THE FIRST payments to miners who contracted the fatal lung diseases silicosis and tuberculosis from a R5 billion class action settlement by gold producers are expected in the second quarter of 2020, a lawyer for the companies said yesterday. The companies involved are Harmony Gold, Gold Fields, African Rainbow Minerals, Sibanye-Stillwater, AngloGold Ashanti and Anglo American South Africa. The latter no longer has gold assets, but at one time was a bullion producer. The most far-reaching class action settlement ever reached in South Africa followed a long legal battle by miners to win compensation for illnesses they say they contracted over decades because of negligence in health and safety. The exact number of eligible claimants is unknown, but is expected to be less than 100 000, attorney Michael Murray told the Mining Indaba in Cape Town. The class action suit was launched in 2012 on behalf of miners suffering from silicosis, an incurable disease caused by inhaling silica dust from gold-bearing rocks, and a settlement was agreed by mining firms in 2018. The disease causes shortness of breath, a persistent cough and chest pains, and makes people highly susceptible to tuberculosis. | Reuters