Hwange Central Member of Parliament, Daniel Molokele (CCC), has criticised Chinese coal miners in the district for not respecting Zimbabwe’s laws in their operations.
This follows complaints from residents of Ingagula township in Hwange about excessive dust pollution caused by Chinese miners’ haulage trucks and coal mining activities.
In a recent interview with VicFallsLive, Molokele alleged that Chinese investors are shielded from scrutiny due to their connections with powerful politicians in Harare.
He argued that this protection has led to a sense of arrogance among the Chinese companies operating in the area Said Molokele:
We have also made efforts to reach out to the Chinese companies, most community local members are complaining that it’s the Chinese companies that are leading in terms of violations of environmental laws and making sure that there’s too much pollution, not just of the air but of the land and the rivers… but what we have learnt is that Chinese companies are very arrogant and they never respect any type of law including labour relations act.
When you look at the terms and conditions of their employees, it’s clear that they are deliberately and arrogantly violating the laws in terms of working hours, in terms of compassionate leave, study leave, medical aid, pension aid and permanent employment and so on…
In terms of health and occupational hazards, awareness and protection, so there’s a lot of violations happening… but it’s the manner in which Chinese investors start investments here in Zimbabwe because they come through high-level politics and they have got connections in Harare and some of the companies that China had set up here in Hwange, they major shareholding include the political elite and that’s where the source of arrogance is coming from… I have been working with other parliamentarians to set up a national chapter for the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China.
We have an organization that works in over 50 countries that has been set up called IPAC headquartered in London that seeks to ensure that Chinese companies wherever they are investing, they have a sustainable development model and they respect local communities.
So we are in the process of setting the national chapter in Zimbabwe, hopefully, it’ll help to increase our capacity to force the Chinese companies to be more accountable.
Molokele pledged to raise the issue in the National Assembly to hold Chinese companies accountable for their environmental and social impact in Hwange.
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