The Zambian Government has signed a US$41 million concessional loan from China for the construction of a 120 kilometre transmission line between Kariba North Bank and Kafue West to boost power output.
According to the agreement, the concessional loan would be provided to the Ministry of Finance through the Export and Import Bank of China.
Chinese Ambassador to Zambia Zhou Yuxiao and Finance Minister Alexander Chikwanda signed the Framework Agreement on March 4, 2014.
In a statement released in Lusaka today, terms of the loan shall be 20 years with a grace period of seven years and the interest rate shall be two per cent.
Mr Zhou said at the signing ceremony that the power expansion project at the Kariba North Bank, which has been under construction by Sinohydro, is almost complete by now.
Two turbines with 180 megawatts each, have been added to the existing power station.
The first one was completed and handed over to the Zambian Government in December last year, while the second one to start trial-operations, will be delivered anytime.
“The transmission line, which is about 90 per cent complete, is meant to transmit the additional electricity at the Kariba North Bank to the Lusaka power grid. People in Lusaka and beyond can expect much less power cuts in the very near future,” the statement said.
Mr Chikwanda expressed gratitude to the Chinese government’s support and help towards Zambia’s endeavour to develop its hydro-power industry which in turn, can power all other industries and bring better life both for city and rural population.
yayayayayayay! and you call this developing a nation were everything from a road to any other tangible develepment is tied to a loan
I long to see the day when we will have visionary leadership who can conceptualize and convert us from a nation of borrowers to a nation of lenders.
Despite the (vacuous) declaration of Zambia as a christian nation, we do not put into practice very basic common sense or take heed of biblical warnings such as – “The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender” Proverb 22 -7.
Surely is this is the legacy, the curse that we burden our children with, to be servants of foreign bank owners????
We need to see the full details of these loans – from interest rates to the small print before some old man signs above the dotted line. Zambia’s predominantly young population and their long term interests are seriously under-represented in the PF government.
No more load shedding by 2016. Good job ABC
Chikwanda is making the same mistakes he made 41 years ago when he was finance minster under Kaunda…. Borrowing without planing and thinking.
20 years from now Chikwanda and Sata will be long gone and it will be my children being pushed by the chinese to pay back this money.
We need young people with fresh blood to run Zambia, young people who understand modern economics and run country with money from the abundant resources that we have and not depend on borrowing all the time.
chikwanda wait a minute, kaloba is so sweet but time pay will comewhen you will nolonger be there. honestly can go for windfall taxi? investors have depleted our mines and all we are going to have is sand in western province, chikwanda are you telling us that your great grandchildren will be exporting sand to foot those loans. let us be serious and mind you zambia isn’t for sata and mamw kaseba.
Fossil Chikwanda doing what he does best signing on the dotted line, meanwhile the kwacha has today breached the K6 per $1 barrier.
Surely what country is this that can not raise $40million it has to borrow everything??
The caption of the picture should have read “Finance Minister Alexander Chikwanda signing away Zambias future”
After wasting all our taxpayers money on Satas salary increase, and by-elections they have now looked in the budget and surprise, surprise, IT IS EMPTY!
So what else can they do except borrow money that they will never pay back!
Gud move
we need investments that fuel development to shame HH and his minions
Why are you getting too many loans, you failed leaders? Consider reintroducing windfall tax instead!
That’s because these old horses won’t be there in 10-20 years time!!
How many Loans has the PF govt signed so far?
Ask that question in Parliament and see what kind of rubbish lies these PF crooks come up with!
Didn’t you see how Kabimba waffled about the CONSTITUTION????
Oh, asking that in Parliament will be dangerous, attracting disciplinary action from the PF Speaker. And Kabimba will say the Opposition MPs are responsible for Govt continued borrowing!
Difficult to know due to the DONCHI KUBEBA motto!
They won’t tell us the whole truth!
Mr Chikwanda is very starved and hungry for money. At this rate, Zambians should brace themselves because most assuredly, the country is going back to the 70s, with the same man who took us into catastrophic failure of the Kwacha.
$1=K6,000 and £1=K10,000.
Mr ABC never learns, but in 2016, he will.
Just auction some open pit mine!
The loan in itself is not bad. The challenge is how many loans has government acquired so far. Twenty years down the line all these loans Zambia will be serving them and its not far. Where are we going to get the money to pay up all these loans. Remember the same development projects will need more resources for maintainance and sustainability. Some of the conditions to these loans sound simple because the money is in our mouth, seven years grace period may seem nothing now to chikwanda. We don’t know other conditions attached to other loans. When all these conditions are put together, I think it’s a time boom. What’s the benefit then of having the so called investors when we cannot even build a 120 kilometer transmission line from our own money?
We are leaving our kids an insurmountable debt burden and that is just so wrong.
Oh what cocroaches have infested our dear land… someone once sang.
the imaturity of our dear PF Government has cost us too much. They have prostituted themselves with corruption and extensive borrowing at the cost of the poor; Their ministerial clawns have danced and pranced around gaily with out-of-tune music; blaming everyone and everything they can imagine, telling lie after after lie without shame; swirling in riches like pigs playing in the mud, talkless of pearls thrown to the pigs, dressing themselves like white washed tombs drenched in a stinch of rotting flesh that will not last to 2016. With their tongue they have decieved, with their deeds they have destroyed, with their time they have hurt us and with their arrogance they have enslaved us;
lets all enjoy and chill ..we must just keep borrowing to fund the ukwas trips abroad, more bye elections, more zamtrop, pay less to the nurses,doctors,teachers, destroy the zambezi to allow mining, poor roads etc etc.
I am sure we will be admired as the country with the highest debt in Africa.
khongole is very sweet….. how will we pay back?GOD help us.
2016 is too far away,we will have auctioned this country by then.
shame we cant get one thing right after 50 years of IN “dependence”
What a gang of corrupt impostors !
They need $41 million while FQM owes ZCCM-IH $600 million, Vedanta has siphoned KCM and Glencore plunders Mopani !!!
Todate How many loans have we aquired from CHINA through the same exim bank? Are these chinese not the same people SATA said he will chase once in power? we need loans from TAIWAN please, thus why tuma chinese are so many in zambia and doing whaterver they want
Debt = the new slavery willingly signed on by the zambian slave himself.
Payback time will come. And china will say: pay back the money in full with interest or give us the entire north-western province. Then the Govt will be forced to sell some of its assets.
How did mwanawasa manage to do all. that he did without borrowing? Did we have more money then? What has changed now! Are those sources of. Income closed fo us to b borowing like this
What did he do? He didn’t borrow an didn’t do anything tangible.Read more before you blog.
Chikwanda is signing loan agreements the way celebrities sign autographs. Does this government know what their total borrowing is so far? If you every single loan since 2016 it will exceed a billion dollars.
This Hopeless.! Africa’s Largest Copper Producer is borrowing a 20 year Loan. pains me.
zambia is ours,lets just make sure this does not affect the lives of the new generations to many loans is costly to the country.
Well done Baudala! The man seems not to age!