By Staff Reporter
Former commerce minister Bob Sichinga says he would take the opportunity to run the mines with his “eyes closed” in the event President Hakainde Hichilema gave him the opportunity to do so.
“With my eyes closed. I will do that immediately. For me this is what Zambia should not be doing, (it) should not be giving away its family jewels. Because you need that. You need the currency. You can use that currency to borrow wherever you are talking about,” Sichinga told Daily Revelation Media, and that even the foreign investors themselves did not use money from shareholders but from the market through the stock exchange. “But you need to be smart, you need to know what you are doing…yes I would run that without any problem whatsoever. I am not saying it’s easy, I am saying it has to be reoriented. And part of re-orientation must come from government because they are the major shareholder.”
However, Sichinga said it was not within his power to appoint himself, but insisted that if the opportunity was availed itself he would be delighted to serve and was prepared to do it having worked for the mines for 10 years, saying Zambia needs to retain the mines in order to generate the income the country wants and generate the loans required.
And Sichinga said inflation was defined as the increase experienced on prices constantly going up, caused by several factors.
He said the rate of inflation could be reduced owing to certain factors like pulling money out of the system and thereby reducing the availability of credit. Sichinga said if that were done, prices may appear to be stagnant when in actual fact, people do not have the money to spend.
He said what the people must ask themselves was whether the prices in the economy were going up or coming down, through instruments like the JCTR monthly indicators for prices in the market.
He said the other indicator was the prices of fuel which he said was K17 when the UPND were coming into office, and even went as far as K26 for fuel and K28 for diesel before coming down to K23. Sichinga said the rise in fuel has been the biggest factor that has affected the prices in the Zambian economy.
He said the other factor was the imported inflation, on account of the goods coming into the country as it was not caused by factors from within but outside the country.
Sichinga insisted that the drop in the inflation rate without the other supporting fundamentals was not possible and mathematically feasible “unless you manipulate it.”
He said the appreciation of the Kwacha should be a benefit but the other factors have remained the same.
“If the other factors in fact increase more than the valuation of our currency then you will still have that gap between them which says the price increases are greater than the the gains in the currency value,” Sichinga said.
He added that the Kwacha has been a beneficiary of a weakened dollar, and not because of Zambia’s economic performance.
Sichinga said for instance, on account of the Americans and their friends sanctioning Russia not to use the Dollar in their trade, the Russians have also demanded that their two main assets, gas and oil be paid to them in Russian Rubble, meaning countries holding Dollars are having to offload their Dollar holdings in their trade with Russia and thereby weakening the Dollar in the process.
“This is a global. It is not just the Zambians benefiting because if you were to do that, if you are to rely on the factors it would have to be reflected from the production and the value of the exports,” he said.
Sichinga said this was the more reason why he has insisted against selling the mines, saying Mopani and KCM must be left in the hands of Zambians just as they were already in Zambian hands.
He wondered why Vedanta would be insisting on keeping what they said was a loss making company, saying ZCCM-IH was an investor and could go to the market to borrow the money for recapitalising mining operations using the Zambian owned ore in the ground.
