The R4.5-billion Chisumbanje ethanol project is threatened with collapse as Zanu PF chiefs, including Cabinet ministers, demand free shares in the lucrative venture under the guise of indigenisation, according to allAfrica.com.
Sources close to the project told Zimbabwe newspaper, The Standard, that powerful people who include MPs, Cabinet ministers and other top government officials (names supplied) were demanding free shares for themselves so as to facilitate the smooth flow of the project.
"The sharks have realised the potential of the project and their mouths are wide open, ready to pounce," said one of the sources. The ethanol project is a partnership between the Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (Arda) and Billy Rautenbach's Green Fuels, Rating and Macdom Investments in a 20-year build-operate-and-transfer (BOT) arrangement signed in 2009.
The source said some politicians were claiming Rautenbach, who was born in Zimbabwe and is linked to Zanu PF, was not indigenous, hence he has to cede 51% shareholding to them in accordance with the indigenisation and economic empowerment act. "He is Zimbabwean, but of the wrong colour," said the source.
