By Mubanga Mubanga
Rains will make it difficult to rescue the remaining accident victims, Chingola Mayor Johnson Kang’ombe has said.
And Kango’mbe has revealed that Vedanta owes Chingola Municipal Council 72 million Kwacha, in terms of rates because they didn’t pay the Council in 2020.
In an interview with Daily Revelation, Kang’ombe said it is unfortunate that rains have started during the current rescue operation.
“We want to make sure we retrieve each and every body, to recover and then… thereafter we are going to make a position as government as instructed by his Excellency President Hakainde Hichilema. At the moment we are mourning, it is quite unfortunate that the rains have now started, it will now be difficult on the people doing the rescue, because we are going to have another water floo … (Floods) you know those flash floods, still getting into the same tunnels you know. It is unconventional mining,” Kang’ombe said.
He said the government was doing everything to retrieve the miners whether dead or alive.
“But we are praying to God. We are going to make sure that all our brothers are retrieved either alive or dead so that their relatives can be able to see that, that is where we put our loved ones,” he said.
Kang’ombe said those who were mining were doing so legally because they were given a license by the previous regime to mine.
“As a government, we promised the people of Chingola, you know Chingola has been…it hosts one of the largest open pit mines in the world. So there are about four dumps which were given to the community. They were given to cooperatives, l think, by the previous regime. There is one slide, Copross, Senseli and I have forgotten the other one called … What is the name of that, Mimbula consortium pit. So these were given to cooperatives and they got the licenses. I shouldn’t call them illegal miners because they have the licenses, so we are just making an appeal if there can be safe mining, because this is what we promised the people to make it mechanised mining,” Kang’ombe said.
On the performance of Vedanta since its return, Kang’ombe said Vedanta is yet to honor its commitment of repaying the debt owed to the Chingola Municipal Council.
“As far as I am concerned, as Chingola Municipal Council, we are expecting Vedanta’s full swing next year. So you know even… I was talking about Vedanta owing Chingola Municipal Council 72 million kwacha, in terms of rates because they didn’t pay the Council in 2020,” said Kang’ombe. “And we have been having a challenge as a municipality, to get that money. So we are also affected, the people of Chingola are also affected because as long as that money hasn’t been paid, hasn’t been cleared because we wanted to clear our council workers, so that we can pay to NAPSA. So that they can also benefit from the 20 percent NAPSA withdrawal. We are owing NAPSA K 3 million kwacha, which we would love to pay as soon as possible. So that our people will be able to access the money.”
