Itai Ndongwe
HARARE – Mutapa Platinum Group has reached financial close on its US$100 million Great Dyke Investments (GDI) project and started construction, with the first phase expected to be commissioned within 12 months.
Chief executive Munashe Shava said the project would be an operating mine producing concentrate by this time next year.
“We have completed our financial closure and moved into project construction. As we speak, the dust is up. The teams are on the ground,” Shava said.
“We are doing our phase one plant construction, which we anticipate to be complete and commissioned in the next 12 months. This will be accompanied by mine development, predominantly opencast mining. So this time next year, it will definitely not be a project but an operating mine producing concentrate.”
The funding came from a group of financiers spread across several markets, with Asian lenders putting up the bulk of the money.
“It’s a boutique of financiers that were picked up all over the world. The major portion is coming from the East, from the Asian markets,” Shava said.
The processing plant will be built in phases. The first stream will treat 600,000 tonnes of ore a year, and a second stream of the same size will follow immediately, lifting capacity to 1.2 million tonnes per annum within 18 months.
“Our optimum level for that project is 4.5 million tonnes per annum, and we should achieve that within our five-year strategic window,” he said.
Beyond concentrate, Mutapa Platinum wants to move into converter matte and refined metal.
“We can’t toil to take out all the material and then just pass on the value to others. We want to participate in that value chain as far down as possible,” Shava said.
The company is in talks with its neighbours at Selous, where Zimplats operates a base metal refinery, and with other miners through the platinum producers’ association.
“As a platinum producers’ association, conversations are at an advanced stage on how best we can come up with a strategy where we, as Zimbabwean producers, can go through the value chain up to the final metal stage,” he said.
Separately, Mutapa Platinum was one of four Mutapa Investment Fund subsidiaries whose chief executives signed integrity pledges with the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) in Harare on Monday. The others were Mutapa Gold Resources, Mutapa Energy Resources and Mutapa Base Metals.
The sovereign wealth fund says the pledges are part of efforts to tighten governance and reduce corruption risks across its portfolio. Each entity will set up an integrity committee, which ZACC will train.
“Platinum is a strategic mineral and as such it should be treated with ethical leadership and proper governance so that we sustainably create value not only for the current generation but for generations to come,” Shava said.
He said the pledge was in line with Mutapa’s existing values and would ensure that dealings with contractors and other third parties stay transparent as the group builds its processing plants.
