By Staff Reporter
Former
Speaking to Daily Revelation, Sichinga urged those in the UPND administration to travel to Botswana to learn how that country has put national interest ahead bysignificantly raising the government’s stake in their natural resources.
He said they were looking for investors yet there was ZCCM-IH which can be used as a channel of investment in the mines.
He said the government claimed ZCCM-IH could not do so because they are losing money, but wondered how that could be when their share partners were making huge profits.
“So we are going backwards because all these issues, we have been through them,” Sichinga said. “It is in our own interest to do the value addition ourselves … What we need are value chains which use copper, cobalt, lithium, Nicol, sugilite, all these minerals, semi-precious stones should not be exported in role form. And the example of Botswana is very illustrative. What has Botswana done? They have moved from 15 percent to 50 percent shareholding. Why can’t Zambia go to Botswana and learn what Botswana has done.”
He said they do not want to do that because they prefer this particular situation where the country is constantly losing money and the currency of the country being devalued.
“So yes we are moving backwards, we are not moving forwards. Instead of developing industries that exploit the copper we have, instead of earning the shares which produce the copper we need they are letting this go to other people,” Sichinga said. “And you ask the question where is their national interest? Where is the national interest by this government?”
He said Hichilema’s government is failing to see the bigger picture, or are choosing not to see the bigger picture as the country will not benefit with the prevailing situation.
Sichinga said President Hichilema and his government could easily remedy the situation if they wanted to, but were not doing it.
“I do not see them taking those steps to deal with national interest to ensure that we maximise benefits from the only asset we have, which is on the minerals and semi precious stones,” Sichinga said. “We are not seeing that? Are they capable? Well, it’s for the people to judge. My own view is that they don’t even have an interest about protecting national interests. The point is why have they not repeated what Kaunda did by creating the ZAMEFAs of this world? Why not expand ZAMEFA? Why not make others like that? They were talking about electric cars, who is the shareholder of electric car batteries processing industries? Who is it? Private sector, private sector, private sector … is a way of now concealing the shareholding that they have in those companies because public sector the selling is in the issue of the capacity of the people. They have just appointed a managing director for ZCCM-IH.
Sichinga said he totally agrees with Dr Mbita Chitala’s assertions that the country is going backwards to eras where it seceded its resources to multinationals without any meaningful benefits from the resources.
He said in 2006, the country moved from the privatisation act to the ZDA Act around which the country could deal with the ownership of the mines, saying in the privatisation act the companies that were to be privatised , the government was expected to hold a golden share in terms of shareholding, but the provision was removed in 2006 with Dr Situmbeko Musokotwane then as economic advisor to late president Levy Mwanawasa.
Said the golden provision had been put in place to secure the country’s shares and so that the government could intervene in the even the investors misbehaved.
He argued that even in the manner the administration of President Hakainde Hichilema handled the transfer of shares in Kansanshi Mine was unconstitutional, as that could not be done without parliamentary approval.
“There was no authority on the executive to sell those 20 percent shares and I was surprised that members of parliament have no raised a motion to stop them from doing that. It’s unconstitutional to sell any asset owned by the government without making reference to parliament,” he said.
Sichinga said the only asset the country has which can guarantee the payment of debt contracted is to have shares in the biggest asset the country has, the minerals.
He said despite the country having no control over the production, the administration of Hichilema has now even gone ahead to reduce royalties.
He said when they relinquished the 20 percent shareholding in Kansanshi, they also reduced the royalty from 6% to 3%, meaning they were getting less of foreign currency which they would need to pay the debt back.
Sichinga said he asked the Secretary to Treasury Nkulukusa on why the government was relinquishing the shareholding in the mines, and his answer was that the government would get more money from mineral royalties than dividends.
But he wondered where FQM got the money to pay the mineral royalties and not dividends, and also why mineral royalty had been reduced from 6 percent to 3 percent.
He said ensuring enough forex from the country’s resources was the only way to ensure debt repayment and Kwacha stability, as it can easily be seen that every time the mines paid towards the government there was an appreciation of the Kwacha as happened two weeks ago when it was trading around K16 to the US Dollar but has now gone to beyond K18 due to lack of forex.
“As we stand at the moment, why is Vedanta pursuing this thing if we are making loses? These companies don’t come here to come and make loses,” Sichinga said. “Vedanta now does not have sufficient money so Glencore is giving Vedanta money so that they can now pursue this matter and get those mines back because Nchanga where Vedanta is operating from has got better ore content that it is at Mufulira or Nkana. So they want that mine back so that they can continue to make money.”
Sichinga said it surprises him that despite all these things which are known and despite there being a lot of Zambians like himself who have handled mines before, those in power are not acting in the interest of the country.
