THE GOVERNMENT’S plans to reopen Kamitivi tin mine in Matabeleland North after reportedly finding a South African investor, are likely to hit a snag following massive asset stripping. RICHARD MUPONDE SENIOR REPORTER
The mine was shut down more than 19 years ago leaving about 1 000 workers jobless. It closed in June 1994 after international tin prices fell to levels that made operations expensive. About $50 million is required to resuscitate operations at Kamativi.
Although former mineworkers were left occupying the mine’s houses, Kamativi resembles a ghost town — with residents living in abject poverty.
When Southern Eye visited the defunct mine last Thursday, it found the one time state-of-the-art tin smelting plant derelict and resembling a scrapyard.
All its components are rusty rendering them dysfunctional. All the houses have been vandalised and the roofing has been ripped off. All electrical installations, tubs, sinks, toilet systems and window frames have been stripped.
The stripping is more rampant in the section once used as the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo National Youth Service. Water pumps and pipes which were used to draw water from Gwayi River, have been looted leaving just a small pump which draws water from the silted Kamativi Dam for domestic use by former workers’ families still residing at the mine compound.
Machinery and mining equipment were not spared either as trucks reportedly descend on the mine at night to carry whatever they can under the guise of collecting scrap metal.
Poverty, misery and utter dejection now characterise life in Kamativi. Some former workers who spoke to Southern Eye confirmed the looting and asset stripping. “There is nothing to talk about here.
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“Most of the machinery was taken away. We don’t know where it was being taken to. Even the investors being touted to re-open the mine will soon run away because they have to start from zero,” a former mineworker said.
“We have just adopted a wait-and-see attitude. In our hearts we are convinced that nothing will happen here. The investments will just end in the newspapers. People have looted everything.”
Mines minister Walter Chidhakwa said he was not aware of the asset stripping and looting at the mine. “I have not received the report. I was with the chairman of Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation and he did not give me such a report.
Now that you have told me I am going to look into it. I will tell you what action I am going to take after I establish what is obtaining on the ground,” Chidhakwa said.
Former Hwange East MP Jealous Sansole said he once proposed to Parliament that the mine be turned into a vocational training college to avoid looting, but his pleas fell on deaf ears.
