Thursday, March 28, 2024

Vedanta defrauded Zambia, it’s shocking that the President Hichilema is oblivious to all this-Fred M’membe

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Socialist Party President Fred M’membe has said that given Vedanta’s dishonesty in the manner it managed KCM, Zambians do not believe it has enough moral and corporate responsibility to come back to operate KCM.

Reacting to reports suggesting the return of KCM, Dr M’membe, posting on his Facebook page said that it was therefore shocking that president Hakainde Hichilema and his UPND government were oblivious to all this.

“Vedanta defrauded this country of billions of dollars in the form of underpricing the mined copper it sold to its subsidiary company in Dubai. It also got the internally generated cash flow and used it as a loan to invest in KCM. These facts were presented in the London High Court in 2014.

“The suffering of our people on the Copperbelt is partly because of the very low contribution to taxes being made by the mining transnational corporations. Zambian workers have to be the burden bearers – collectively paying more taxes and higher electricity tariffs than the mining corporations. The mining corporations have been given tax holidays” he said

Dr M’membe said that their mineral royalty payments have been made deductible in corporation tax computations, meaning mining transnational corporations will be paying very little corporation tax, if not nothing.

“Given the type of people handpicked by Mr Hichilema to handle KCM, we will not be surprised if special purpose vehicles are set up to establish personal interests in this company,’ concluded the post.

22 COMMENTS

    • HH has danced around this issue because he is deeply attached to this saga. He was rendered financial support for his campaign while in opposition by these Vendetta crooks at the period when Edgar Lungu was attempting to grab back the mines from Vendetta. These Indians are daring HH at all cost and he has no answer for the problem. Its almost like they are blackmailing HH. We have a minister of mines who is spineless.

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  1. Govt has no money to run KCM and KCM can win any court case and seek for compasation if their mine is grabbed from them. Based on these facts, what is your suggestion Mr Membe on how the situation should be handled so that its a win win solution?

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  2. Himself was not paying statutory obligations when he was running his newspaper, according to him it is not okay for vedanta to defraud but okay for him to do the same. Strange opposition leaders Zambia has

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    • @ Kamboni …. Spot on
      Double standard ba M’membe.
      Read the Bible about the log in your eye before denouncing someone.

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    • Imagine and he has blind followers in his party who are okay to call him a Socialist with such a stained CV….really laughable.

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    • Tarino Orange…. just check old postings on LT and you will see how much sympathy Mmembe received from the majority of Upnd members then you will understand what I am talking about.

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  3. Just look at how carefully worded his articles are this Rich Socialist Mmembe; you would be mistaken for thinking that Vendenta was defrauding Zambia under HH’s watch…he omits the PF era of his friend Michael and Lazy Lungu. If you were honest with your assessment people would listen to you but you always try to be sly given that we all detest vile Vendenta Chairman Anil Agarwal and his greedy clan of nephews and nieces now incharge.
    You Mmembe too defrauded the Zambian people when you never paid tax only a fraction was recovered…you defrauded Zambians when you failed to pay that loan you took for that airline from DBZ. You are a hypocrite.

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  4. Just trying to figure it out…. before the mine was grabbed Vedanta were telling the nation that they were operating at a loss and also talked about dwindling reserves. So what is it that these Indians want from a supposedly dead mine? Just asking.

  5. Ventedtta have a veto over KCM………….

    They can block or delay any sale of KCM , leading to…………

    GRZ bleeding millions just to keep KCM on life support………….

    Let them run KCM on a 50 % share basis if they want to come back…….

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    • Whether they run at 50% or 40/60 they will still rip you off when they transfer price to their subsidy firms … you can not also want 50% when you dont have the capital to bring to the table.

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    • TO

      Zambia can claim the mine as a strategic national asset and fully nationalise it.
      Zambia owns the mine, it does not need capital to demand a 50 % share.

  6. A person wanting to be President of a country must deal in cold facts and not hot emotions. If you have evidence of that fraud bring it out and pas it on to legal bodies, both local and international to look at and sanction Vedanta wherever they do business. If you speak from without, you are not fit to be President but an idle tittle-tatler.

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    • And it seems you NEVER paid attention to the London Court case that M’membe is referring to, right??? If I am not mistaken, Vendanta was barred from trading on the London Stock Exchange as a result of that case. So when M’membe talks about fraud perpetuated by Vendanta on the Zambian Govt, undisputed evidence is there and HH/UPND is aware of it. This was reason ECL was trying to grab KCM. It was partially based on the evidence produced in a Court case in London. ECL did NOT just do what he did based on nothing or just being vindictive because he didn’t like Vendanta, NO!!!

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  7. Vendanta dribbled Mwanawasa to purchase KCM mine, at that time buyatashi looked promising; Vendanta put RB in its pocket and later cheated Sata and ECL. ECL responded by grabbing KCM mine. Vendanta funded UPND 2021 August elections. Therefore, Zambians do not need UPND but Zambians themselves to get what belongs to them, KCM mine. No matter what, we do not need Vendanta. There is just nothing in Vendanta for Zambians but losses.

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