Murowa Diamond Speak On Dispute With Sese Community
Murowa Diamond Company has downplayed the impasse between the diamond mining company and the Sese community in Chivi after the latter urged the government to stop the company’s mining activities.
Sese community is accusing Murowa Diamond, now officially known as RZM Murowa Pvt (Ltd), of damaging roads with their heavy-duty exploration equipment making it even difficult to move agricultural inputs to their fields.
RZM Murowa Vice President(Human Resources and Administration)Mr Islam Chipango, however, said he was hopeful they would find each other. He said:
What we have is not a dispute but its a misunderstanding with the Sese community and we have engaged the district development coordinator(Mr Innocent Matingwina) who is working to resolve it and we are now waiting to hear from his office having furnished him with all the paperwork and information pertaining to our exploitation activities.
As RZM Murowa we have a community engagement plan that we follow when getting into an area, we engage the local leadership that is councillor and traditional leaders, the district development coordinator and also the Ministry of Mines and Mining Development in our case.
Chipango attributed the misunderstanding to the departure of officials his company engaged upon starting operations in Chivi were no longer there.
He also expressed the company’s desire to “co-exist peacefully with the people of Sese” adding that they were given authority to camp at Danhamombe by the relevant authority as they could “not just go and camp at a school without permission.”
Chipango admitted that while RZM equipment had damaged some roads in Sese rehabilitation work could not kick-off under the current rainy season.
Villagers, however, said the company was being inconsiderate to their plight even after damaging the roads and some of their fields.
Mr Matingwana pledged to bring the warring parties together to have an amicable solution to the dispute.
More: The Herald
