African Consolidated Seeks Marange Evictions

Posted in News by Admin on December 7th, 2009

African Consolidated Resources [ACR] has approached the High Court to evict two companies recently granted concessions to exploit diamonds in Chiadzwa as well as two other mining concerns.

ACR is seeking to bar the Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation, Mbada Mining (Private) Limited, Marange Resources (Private) Limited and Canadile Miners (Private) Limited from exploiting diamonds that it says fall under its own claims.

Mbada and Canadile recently started operations in Chiadzwa and a high-level ministerial team visited the area two weeks ago to see what progress they had made in developing the claims.

Mbada is a joint venture concern between ZMDC, Marange Resources and Mauritius’ Grandwell Holdings Limited.

Canadile brings together ZMDC, Marange Resources and an unnamed third party. Marange Resources is a ZMDC subsidiary.

In late September, Justice Charles Hungwe reversed a government decision to cancel ACR’s permit and ordered ZMDC to cease its prospecting and diamond mining activities there. The court also ordered the release of 129,400 carats of diamonds owned by ACR that had been seized by police two years ago. But the judgment was silent on the eviction of the four companies that have been mining the fields.

On Thursday, ACR’s lawyer, Jonathan Samkange, filed an urgent chamber application in the High Court seeking the companies’ eviction. The case will be handled by Justice Ben Hlatshwayo on a date yet to be set.

ZMDC, Marange Resources, Canadile Miners, Mbada Mining, Mines and Mining Development minister Orbert Mpofu, the Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe and police commissioner-general Augustine Chihuri are cited as respondents.

In the application, ACR director  Andrew Noel Cranswick submitted that ZMDC and Marange Resources should vacate the area. He said Canadile Miners and Mbada Mining were mining on a large scale on ACR claims, which was prejudicial to them.  Cranswick said the companies were mining under a special grant to ZMDC that the High Court had ruled did not apply to ACR’s claims.

“Consequently, it is evident that the diamond mining conducted by third and fourth respondents (Mbada Mining and Canadile Miners) on the ACR claims (is) unlawful and (has) been unlawful from the very beginning.

“Since the ACR claims are valid, only the applicants are fully entitled to conduct diamond mining activities on the claims,” he said.

Mbada Mining is said to have arranged for importation of an aeroplane into the country and has leased the old terminal at Harare International Airport. Both Mbada and Canadile are understood to have pumped millions of dollars into developing the claims. However, ACR wants to resume mining but feels the respondents should first remove their property and vacate the claims.

In the event that the application is granted, ACR applies that any appeal to be noted should not have the effect of suspending the High Court ruling.

In a certificate for urgency of the case,  Samkange said ACR stood to suffer irreparable damage if the companies continued their illegal mining.

“Mining claims have a limited lifespan, which in some cases would be for a very short period, and the longer the respondents mine on these claims, the more the applicants suffer irreparable harm.

“It would be difficult for the applicants to be able to ascertain the monetary value of the extracted diamonds and to be fully compensated for such loss,”  Samkange said.