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Mr Mpinga

Business Reporter
MWANA Africa considers Zimbabwean assets to be the most important to the multi-commodity group’s portfolio because they hold the best financial opportunity, chief executive Mr Kalaa Mpinga has said.

Mr Mpinga made the remarks in a recent interview with market research company, Edison, during which he also boldly declared, by recent performance, that Mwana was now poised to deliver on its objectives.

The Mwana chairman was responding to several questions, including reasons why the company had gone the extra mile to defend four board members targeted for removal from the board by certain shareholders the company believes harbour ulterior motives.

Mr Mpinga said while Mwana’s biggest financial challenges were in Zimbabwe, its best financial opportunities were also in the mineral rich southern African country where it has its two most valued assets.

“Our operations are based, primarily in Zimbabwe. Certainly our most important projects are in Zimbabwe. The biggest financial challenges, the biggest financial opportunities are in Zimbabwe,” he said.

The Alternative Investment Market listed miner holds 85 percent in Zimbabwe’s second biggest gold producer, Freda Rebecca, and 75,4 percent stake in Africa’s only integrated nickel producer, BNC.

Mr Mpinga also said it was important to retain the current board, which boasts a wealth of technical expertise in the field of mining and extensive exposure to the Zimbabwean business environment through two directors with vast experience working in the country.

The Zimbabwean directors are said to have provided “invaluable advice” during the recent successful launch of BNC’s $20 million bond issue meant to finance the restart of its nickel smelter in Bindura.

“So we believe that a strong track record and expertise in the Zimbabwean business environment is probably one of the most important things we need and this current board played a very critical role in assisting me and the management team in securing Government approval to get the ($20 million) bond in place,” he said.

Mr Mpinga also said most of Mwana’s challenges were around technical issues. So, at a time the company is developing mines in DRC and restarting others in South Africa, what is needed are people with technical hands on experience and people who have built firms.

Mwana Africa extracts gold and nickel from two mines in Zimbabwe and has interests in several other projects in Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Mr Mpinga said former finance director Mr Oliver Barring and former chairman Mr Mark Wesley Wood were behind the requisition by Mr Ian Dearing, a director representing the interest of shareholders with significant equity in the group, to expel four directors.

Both Mr Wood and Mr Barring were unanimously removed from the board.

Mr Mpinga said the company had performed better since the two directors’ departure, but expressed surprise why they were supporting the requisition for a meeting to eject the directors.

Among other things, the requisition for the meeting seeks to remove Zimbabwean directors Mr Ngoni Kudenga and Mr Herbert Mashanyare and two other directors Stuart Morris and Johan Botha, as directors of Mwana and to replace them with Scott Morrison, Mark Wellesley-Wood, Olivier Barbeau and Anne-Marie Chidzero.

Mr Mpinga said the requisitioners were trying to intervene in a dispute between the company and its largest shareholder, CIMCG, which was referred to courts, over a breached relationship agreement, yet the parties to the dispute were also trying to resolve it out of courts. Mwana, Mr Mpinga said, probably recorded its best ever half year financial performance in the half-year period to December 2014, this following the departure of Mr Barring and Mr Wood as directors and was firmly positioned to deliver on shareholders’ mandate.

Nonetheless, he said the board had managed to discharge its duties as normal despite the unnecessary distraction posed by the requisition for a meeting of the company to discuss the issue of directors.