War vets demand stake in Marange diamonds

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MUTARE — War veterans here are demanding a 20% stake in the Marange-Zimunya Share Community Ownership Trust saying there has been no equitable distribution of wealth in the country since 1980.

MUTARE — War veterans here are demanding a 20% stake in the Marange-Zimunya Share Community Ownership Trust saying there has been no equitable distribution of wealth in the country since 1980.

BY CLAYTON MASEKESA

President Robert Mugabe launched the trust last year with five mining companies — Mbada Diamonds, Marange Resources, Anjin and Diamond Mining Company (DMC) — expected to contribute US$10 million each.

Mutare district war veteran chairman, Charles Tirivaviri Rugwandi told Zanu PF secretary for administration, Didymus Mutasa at a party meeting recently, that former freedom fighters in Manicaland have been reduced to paupers, although the province was awash with minerals.

“As war veterans, we would like to register our displeasure, that since independence, we are still living in abject poverty. We have not yet indigenised because only a few are benefitting from the indigenisation programme,” he said. “Our members do not have decent accommodation or even land to farm, while some of the big wigs have used their muscle to grab vast tracts of land. No-one is above the law. We are all equal before the law.”

Rugwandi asked where the funds generated from the mining of diamonds from Chiadzwa were being channelled to.

Rugwandi said the war veterans wanted the party to expedite investigations into the case involving suspended Zanu PF chairman, Mike Madiro and five others, who are accused of converting over US$700 000 from diamond mining firms in Chiadzwa to their own use.

In response, Mutasa said war veterans had “100% ownership of diamonds in Marange”, adding that Mbada chairman, Robert Mhlanga, also a war veteran, was taking care of the issue.

“Mhlanga is a war veteran and he is greatly assisting us as a party.”