Zimbabwe Quickly Sells USD4Billion Lithium Mine To Chinese for Paltry USD5,000
13 April 2022
Spread the love

By Baba Jukwa | This Paul Chimbodza is my very long time friend and he had during the GNU  even approached Morgan Tsvangirai about this deal: but unfortunately the trade unionist was not interested in business. He told his family, “vazukuru ngatimbobvisa Mugabe then we talk about this later.”

FULL TEXT | FOWARDED ANALYSIS

This is how dumb we are.

Baba Jukwa

“ So now, back to the story: 2 Zimbabweans, Professsor Kingston Kajese and Paul Chimbodza get a lithium claim. They, in turn, sell 87% of the claim to an Australian company (Prospect Resources). So far, no mining is done .
The Australian company then sells the lithium mine to a Chinese firm.
The Chinese mine, Huayou pays $422 million for the mine. Of the $422 million, $388 goes to the Australian mine and $44 million shared between Chimbodza and Kajese. Someone at the top approves the deal.

Baba Jukwa

In one move, Zimbabwe has just sold one of the most strategic minerals to the Chinese with no gain for the country ( Australia gains USD388 million while 2 Zimbabweans get USD44 million). All the Zimbabwean public through the government get is no more than USD5,000, being licensing and other fees.
Now, here is why, as a country, we are stupid. The future is electric cars and solar energy, both of which require lithium.
The price of lithium is now USD17 000 per tonne.

The Chinese mine has said it intends to mine 2.4 million tonnes a year . This translates to USD 4.1 billion a year or USD342 million a month .
Remember they bought the mine for $422 million. Within 1 month, the Chinese would have returned what they paid.

So why did our government allow such a stupid deal when in Zimbabwe we have to import lithium batteries from South Africa?

Why could our government not see the same potential the Chinese saw?
Instead, we could have easily partnered with Tesla to mine the lithium and manufacture lithium batteries in Zimbabwe while partnering local companies such as Exide.
Kajese and Chimbodza are the only 2 Zimbabweans to benefit from this.
Most of the employment generated will go to Chinese nationals. We will be left only with a destroyed and polluted environment.

How can we be so stupid as a nation? How could someone at the top endorse such a strategic mineral”