Maravi

NWR project still awaiting ZEMA approval - Kavindele

NWR project still awaiting ZEMA approval - Kavindele
By Gift Chanda
Wed 04 Jan. 2012, 13:25 CAT

ENOCH Kavindele says the construction of a railway line between Chingola and Solwezi has been delayed by the revised Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) which ZEMA is yet to approve.

In an interview, Kavindele, the current chairman of North West Railway Company, said works on the US$500 million new railway line to the North Western Province could have begun by now had the Zambia Environmental Management Authority (ZEMA) approved the revised EIA submitted by the developers.

Kavindele said the developers were ready to commence works on the railway project, adding that the EIA approval was the only thing delaying the take-off of the project.

He said the financing side of the project had already been completed.

"The Americans and the Chinese who are part of the project are already here in Zambia. Unfortunately, we cannot move without the Environmental Impact Assessment approval," he said. "The financing was done about two years ago. In fact, we are now paying penalties because the financiers are saying we are not using their monies."

A United States company, Tagos Group, signed the financing deal with the North West Railway Company for the railway line during last year's Africa Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) conference.

The Tagos Group together with other financiers such as the African Development Bank (AfDB), agreed to finance the construction of the 254-kilometre railway line that will link the country's new copper mining area - the North Western Province - to the Copperbelt Province.

The US$500 million project, which would also link Zambia to Angola at the border town of Mwinilunga, would employ about 4,000 people during the construction stage.

"We hope to get the EIA approval in the first quarter of this year," Kavindele said.

He was confident that the project would get environmental approval from ZEMA before end of the first quarter of 2012 because the authority had initially approved the first EIA submitted by the developers.

"They asked us to do a revised EIA because they thought with passage of time things had changed…they fear that where there was a bush they could be a village now," he said.

In May 2008, then communications minister Dora Siliya announced the termination of NWR's railway licence to build the railway which could have been Zambia's third line, alleging the company was "not serious" about developing the line.

The licence was only restored last year.

Kavindele said he was not bitter with the people who led to the revocation of the licence at the time the firm had even completed the feasibility study for the line that would ultimately provide Zambia's rail link to oil-rich Angola.

Labels: ENOCH KAVINDELE, RAIL

posted by MrK @ 8:01 PM