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Vedanta tries to raise copper cash after Hichilema settled Konkola fight

Offering incentives and resolving disputes, the government is wooing investors old and new

Vedanta Resources, the mining and energy company controlled by Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal, is considering listing its Zambian copper unit to raise the finance it promised to invest in its operations at Konkola Copper Mines as part of the deal struck with the government.

‘Listing is an option,’ Ajay Goel, chief financial officer of Vedanta, said on 2 May, adding while this was ‘under active consideration’, there was no definitive timeline or plan for how much money Vedanta would seek to raise.

Mining insiders say that Vedanta was unpopular with the local community around Konkola and significantly under-utilised the mine's resources, President Hakainde Hichilema’s government is desperate to use Zambia’s mining and minerals to drive the economy (AC Vol 65 No 6, Can mega discovery end debt impasse? & Vol 64 No 24, Tracking the missing billions).

The company regained control of the KCM last year after Hichilema quietly ended a five-year dispute started by his predecessor Edgar Lungu’s Patriotic Front government. Lunga’s officials had seized Konkola after accusing Vedanta of lying about expansion plans and paying too little tax. Vedanta paid US$246 million to the government last July as part of the settlement to retake control of KCM.

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