Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe said on Friday his government would soon ban private trade in gold, and require producers to sell the mineral through a state company.
Addressing an annual conference of his ZANU-PF party, Mugabe also warned that platinum miners, including the local unit of South Africa’s Implats Platinum, must build a refinery within two years or risk losing their licences.
The ZANU-PF government, he said, was determined to drive its black economic empowerment programme forcing foreign-owned firms to sell majority stakes to locals and helping to industrialise the country.
A unity government formed in 2009 between Mugabe and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change had allowed gold miners to independently export their gold, mainly to South Africa in a bid to help ramp up production.
But Mugabe said the government would soon require producers to sell through the state-owned Fidelity company, a central bank firm which used to enjoy this monopoly.
“We would want to centralise that. There is a lot of illicit dealing in gold, there is a lot of externalisation of earnings, and that has to stop,” he said.
“To the miners, they should sell to Fidelity only.” Reuters
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