BUSINESS REPORTER
Zimbabwe’s all-weather bank, the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), has signed financing agreements worth US$188m with four local entities to boost power supplies and finance imports of raw materials.
The deals were concluded during the second Intra-African Trade Fair (IATF2021) currently taking place in Durban and runs up to November 21. The fair opened on November 15.
On Wednesday, Afreximbank signed with the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC) a US$110.4m Syndicated Term Loan Facility. The funds will help ZETDC to improve revenue collection through smart meters and prepaid meters and thus pay off regional creditors’ accounts, the Cairo-headquartered bank said in a statement.
Afreximbank provided the Central African Building Society with a US$40m facility to support its participation in a syndicated facility aimed at improving the supply of electricity in Zimbabwe through the payment of legacy debt and the importation of prepaid meters.
The bank also signed a US$28.2m dual-tranche facility with CBZ Bank to provide offshore foreign currency in Zimbabwe.
The transaction will also help finance the import of raw materials for key industries, thereby creating jobs and, in some cases, facilitating export diversification, Afreximbank said.
ZB Bank signed a US$10m term sheet that will enable its participation as one of the syndicated lenders in a facility for the energy sector in Zimbabwe.
By providing adequate financing for power generation and transmission infrastructure, the facility will help companies in Zimbabwe’s mining, manufacturing and industrial sectors to increase their capacity, thereby contributing to exports and GDP, with a knock-on effect on employment levels and foreign exchange generation, Afreximbank said.
The facility to boost electricity supplies comes as Zimbabwean firms and households have endured rolling power cuts that last for up to 15 hours as the power utility struggle to meet demand after a technical fault at Hwange power station. With an installed capacity of 920MW, Hwange was generating 228MW as of Friday.
