CHENGETAI ZVAUYA
United Kingdom-headquartered investment management firm Gemcorp Capital has expressed interest in investing in Zimbabwe’s megabucks fuel sector, it has been established.
This came out when Gemcorp officials recently met with Energy and Power Development Minister Joram Gumbo in Bulawayo on the sidelines of the Parliamentary 2019 pre- budget conference.
Gumbo said that following on their meeting with President Mnangagwa last week, Gemcorp had expressed interest in the energy sector inclusive of fuel, hydro-power and solar biogas.
Gemcorp last month also extended a $250 million credit line to Zimbabwe to facilitate the importation of essentials such as fuel and medicine.
“Following up on their meeting with President Mnangagwa, I have held discussions with Gemcorp officials after they expressed interest in the energy sector. We have exchanged information and brochures. This is all part of the Zimbabwe is Open for Business Agenda,” said Gumbo.
Gemcorp was formed in 2014 by Atanas Bostandjev, a former executive of Russian investment bank VTB Capital, part of banking group VTB.
Meanwhile, Gumbo said Government had set up a Fuel Reserve Fund to maintain a strategic reserve of sixty days’ cover. This is in an effort to avoid the outages that occurred in late October.
Gumbo also said he had finished his tour of Beira-Feruka pipe line and was satisfied that the fuel line was being fully utilised by Zimbabwe and Mozambique. He said as a result, plans to construct a second pipeline had been shelved.
The pipeline in Mozambique is owned by Compania Do Pipeline Mozambique Zimbabwe (CPMZ) and the government was making payment towards the use the pipeline.
“The pipeline is operating smoothly and there is no need for people to panic on the capacity of the line. I am of the opinion that we can continue to use the Beira- Feruka line and instead of building another one, we can just expand it.”
