THE Parliament of Zimbabwe has encouraged Government to delay the US$1,8 billion debt repayment and channel the money towards small-scale miners in order to strengthen the country’s economic revival efforts.
In a post-budget seminar held by the Parliament of Zimbabwe this week in Harare, Speaker of the National Assembly Advocate Jacob Mudenda said the 2017 National Budget did not adequately address policy measures and strategies to empower small-scale miners.
Zimbabwe owes the three preferred creditors – the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and the African Development Bank (AfDB) — a combined US$1,8 billion, which it promised to release to clear the country’s huge debt deficit which is now almost US$10 billion.
Zimbabwe has already repaid the IMF overdue obligation and hopes to clear the World Bank and AfDB’s arrears by April.
Advocate Mudenda said there was need to look into the possibility of delaying the US$1,8 billion debt repayment in order to support small-scale miners who delivered 42 percent of gold to Fidelity Printers last year.
He said Treasury did not take into consideration some proposals made by Members of Parliament during the formulation of the 2017 National budget.
“Despite our proposals, the Budget did not adequately address policy measures and strategies to empower small scale miners,” said Adv Mudenda.
“The budget did not avail adequate resources to Fidelity Printers to capacitate small scale gold producers as we had proposed.
“As we deliberate, let us look into the possibility of delaying the US$1,8 billion debt repayment so that we can first support the small scale miners who delivered no less than 42 percent of gold to Fidelity Printers last year.”
Capacitating artisanal miners with
US$1 billion, said Adv Mudenda, could contribute no less than US$3 billion to the fiscus.
“We need to balance our books, therefore, we need to prioritise the things for national development,” he said.
“How about mopping funds from pensions and insurance portfolios such as NSSA and Old Mutual?”
Submitting its key priorities for the 2017 National Budget and outcomes from the public consultations meeting, Parliament recommended the promotion and regularisation of operations of small-scale and artisanal miners to reduce leakages and widen its revenue base.
It also called for the crafting and implementation of a minerals value addition and beneficiation strategy and other policies that support such as well as treat diamonds the same way as gold and auction diamonds through the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) for purposes of transparency and accountability
During the review of Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa’s 2017 National Budget, legislators cited corruption as the reason the exploitation of minerals was not being explored.
“I am deeply concerned that the budget did not do justice to the exploration of Zimbabwe’s vast mineral resources, especially along the Great Dyke,” Adv Mudenda said
“Our knowledge of our mineral wealth underground should facilitate the securitisation of our minerals on a back-to-back loan against a mineral concession or going the route of outright sale of some concessions on a pre-payment basis.”
He said the 2017 National Budget can surpass the US$10 billion mark if the country fully exploits chrome and gold mineral deposits.
The national budget has been averaging US$4 billion for the past three years.
“Our pre-budget stance was on domestic resource mobilisation,” he said.
“My firm belief is that through domestic resource mobilisation, Zimbabwe’s annual budget can surpass US$10 billion.
“I did not hear the budget pontificating on the sale of raw chrome, whose reserves are abundant in and around Kwekwe, which when properly extracted and marketed, can generate approximately US$3billion annually.
“Let me hasten to share with you the disappointment I felt when I learnt of a company which is being denied permission to export chrome finds, whose proceeds were estimated at between US$2billion and US$3billion.
“Why should we cut our nose to spite our face?”
In his 2017 National Budget, Minister Chinamasa said the mining sector would grow by 0,9 percent next year against the backdrop of depressed commodity earnings, coupled with marginal output gains from minerals such as gold and chrome.