Businessman and Uzumba MP Simbaneuta Mudarikwa believes successful implementation of indigenisation policies in mining largely depends on national strategies and the revamping of the Mines and Minerals Act, as well as the Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe (MMCZ) Act.
The legislator appeared yesterday before the Thematic Committee on Indigenisation and Empowerment chaired by Chimanimani Senator Monica Mutsvangwa to give oral evidence on quarry mining operations by his company, Natural Stone, in Mutoko. Mudarikwa owns 20% shares with the other 80% shares owned by Germans.
The committee asked Mudarikwa to explain if the indigenisation policy was being fully utilised as well as reports that 66 deaths had occurred since the mining of granite started.
The committee was also inquiring about negative work safety practices that have allegedly resulted in men claiming their backs had been broken, rendering most of them failing underperformers in bed.
“Successful implementation of indigenisation policies depends on national strategies because you can go and indigenise the mines, but when banks are not indigenised we are going nowhere,” said Mudarikwa.
“There are more than 50 000 mine claim holders registered with the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development, but they cannot venture into that field because banks cannot lend them money,” he said.
Mudarikwa continued: “We need amendments to the Mines and Minerals Act and the MMCZ Act because if MMCZ gets 2% from every invoice, why can they not pay 1% to the Mutoko Rural District Council for their granite resources?”
He, however, denied allegations that a lot of men had broken their spines at work after using the heavy machinery.
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“The ability to lie is a gift from Satan and to say 66 people died is not true. The issue of people breaking their backs while doing their jobs and resulting in their failure to perform in the bedroom is also baseless.
“We actually have lots of forms of people saying their wives are going on maternity leave and the children given birth to look like their fathers,” he said.
