Mer 29 Juil 2009 16:52
Maamba Collieries yet to pay Oriental Quarries for mining
le lien :
http://www.postzambia.com/content/view/11710/50/
Maamba Collieries yet to pay Oriental Quarries for mining
Written by Mwala Kalaluka
MAAMBA Collieries Limited (MCL) is yet to meet its payment obligations to Oriental Quarries for the quantities of coal mined under the contract mining arrangement from May to date.
MCL managing director Stephen Mutambo said in an interview yesterday that Oriental Quarries, which was undertaking contract mining activities at the mine for a year, was paid for the initial 12, 000 tonnes of coal mined in April this year.
“We have the second tonnage of 28, 000 tonnes but you see, this was in May. These guys give us 30 days from invoice. If they invoice us 15 days after the due date, then we pay them after that date,” Mutambo said. “We are talking…in any business there are delays.”
Mutambo said MCL had produced so much coal from April to date but that the company management had a problem to sell the commodity.
“Everybody is buying from Zimbabwe. What is the government doing about it?” he asked. “Because Maamba is not selling coal they face a problem of not meeting their obligations, especially with their contract miner.”
Mutambo said there was need to look at ways of establishing a long-term customer relationship, as regards the supply of coal, especially that most of the buyers of the Maamba coal had switched to Zimbabwe.
However, Mutambo said the outstanding payment invoices to Oriental Quarries would be settled to ensure that the contractor had enough liquidity to continue in mining.
Mutambo said management, in collaboration with ZCCM-IH who are the mine owners, had managed to reduce the cost of production from US$80 per tonne to about US$45 per tonne.
“Our new business model is that the contractor will do drilling, blasting, excavation of soft and hard overburden up to coal seam and de-coaling of coal and haulage up to the washing plant. The only cost for all these is the fixed cost of US$31 a tonne delivered to the washing plant,” Mutambo said. “Maamba, all it does is to wash the coal and make sure the contractor is committed to what can be delivered.”
He said MCL expected to reach 30, 000 tonnes production of coal by the end of this month and that there were currently about 50, 000 tonnes of washed and graded coal that was ready for the market out of the over 90, 000 tones produced from April this year.
“We have US$5.4 million value of stocks that is available,” said Mutambo.
Sources told The Post that the future of MCL was bleak following Oriental Quarries’ concerns over the non-payment of funds for the coal produced under the contract mining set-up at the Sinazongwe-domiciled mine.