Harare -Zimbabwe and Impala Platinum Holdings [JSE:IMP], the world’s second-largest platinum producer, said
on Tuesday they agreed on the transfer of a 51% stake in the company’s
local unit Zimplats to black investors in the country, as required by the
government.
“Essentially we have found each other and that augurs well for the
mining industry in Zimbabwe,” Implats chief executive David Brown told a news
conference after a joint statement confirmed the deal.
The agreement ends a war of words between the government and
Implats over the ownership requirement, which had jolted investor confidence and was widely seen as a populist tactic by President
Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party in the run-up to elections expected later this
year.
It remained unclear however how the cash-strapped Zimbabwean
government would pay for the stake worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
The joint statement said the 51% would be broken down as
follows: 10% to the community, another 10% to Zimplats employees
and 31% to the state’s National Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment
Fund.
“The details are about the value. How do they value the shares? All
that is to be worked out,” he said.