In the recent and weekend press a further spate of repeat negative tone articles of the type recently covered.....Govt sets up team to look into BCL etc. etc. (19/70 from Bots Daily News, Sunday Standard, and a further very negative doom sayer one in The Business Weekly and Review Sun 31 July, article written 25 July http://www.businessweekly.co.bw/the-death-of-a-mining-town/.............
I take these articles as speculative and with a few grains of salt, especially as the following article which expands on and is similar to the one posted on HC 19/7 by kermitos, again categorically states BCL will be keptgoing, no matter what others are claiming, and which quotes the Vice President.
Sunday, 31 July 2016 Home » News » General » BCL only alive because of the 5000 jobs BCL only alive because of the 5000 jobs
Publishing Date : 25 July, 2016 Author : AUBREY LUTE Government looks set to keep operations alive at BCL mine following a tumultuous time at the Selibe Phikwe open shaft with copper nickel prices hitting rock bottom and the smelter operations failing regularly.
Vice President Mokgweetsi Masisi pronounced while in Kigali at the African Union summit that Botswana will maintain 1.4 billion pula of annual spending on state-owned BCL Ltd. even as it wants to move away from mining, because the copper and nickel producer employs as many as 5,000 people.
“Only for the reason of wanting to save jobs, and the hope and promise that prices might go up, the government kept on putting in more money,” Mokgweetsi Masisi stressed in an interview Sunday in Rwanda’s capital, Kigali. “There will come a point where a decision is made. We have got about 15 more years to go. It’s hot, deep, poor-quality ore -- it’s like flagging an old woman and asking her to run in the Olympics.”
The Government position on the BCL could be deducted from a narrative piece in support of BCL by the secretary general of the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), Botsalo Ntuane some two months back when he vowed that his government will do anything possible to protect or save the 5000 jobs at the BCL mine.
From Vice President Masisi’s interview Government wants to protect the 5000 jobs and is hopeful that prices will improve over time. “There is no way that the BCL mine will be shut down because that will bring down an entire eastern region,” said an analyst who works for the University of Botswana.
Apart from the jobs, BCL has so many other businesses and companies relying on it, some of which employ hundreds of people. This publication has established that companies such as Botsogo medical aid scheme get almost 60 percent of their business from BCL. A number of banks in the eastern region are also reliant on BCL for business. This is in addition to the fact that thousands of BCL employees have accessed financial services with these banks. MALFUNCTIONING SMELTER
Another problem for the troubled mine has been the smelter. It has not been functioning continuously as expected hence bleeding the mine millions of Pula in lost revenue from smelting ore from other mines; as well as the high cost of maintaining it. At some point recently, this publication understands that the smelter was not working for over a month and an expert, who used to work for BCL, had to be called in from Zambia to come and help fix it. The smelter is expected to help the mine pick up its revenue but this has been difficult to achieve because of the fault associated with it. Just as an example, the smelter rakes in P30 million for the BCL monthly for work it does on the ore from Nkomati mine.
Responding to inquiries on the BCL Smelter, Public Relations Manager, Mr James Molosankwe said the smelter experiences normal spate of breakdowns attendant to any plant which are being addressed through normal preventive and maintenance protocols. He said the BCL has a capable maintenance team that does the plant preventative maintenance. However, when the need arise to get experts’ advice it is sought from time to time. Asked if it is true that the smelter needs another shutdown of about a month so as to fully repair it, Molosankwe said: “Not true. However, the Waste Heat Boiler (WHB) requires a statutory inspection every two years, the one having being done in 2015.” GOVERNMENT POURING IN MILLIONS
In May this year Government had said it plans to sell its stake in the BCL as soon as it returns to profitability. The price of copper, used to make cables, has increased 3 percent in 2016 after plunging for three straight years while nickel has rallied 17 percent following the biggest annual decline since 2008 last year.
Masisi revealed that his Government is pouring in about P110 million, P120 million every month. “It’s unprofitable, unsustainable and expensive,” he was quoted saying.
Government underwrote a $100 million loan from Barclays Bank to the mine in April and BCL plans to raise $250 million in a bond sale and use some of the proceeds to repay the debt and also fund its purchase of a 50 percent stake in South Africa’s Nkomati mine from OAO GMK Norilsk Nickel.
BCL, board chairman, Akolang Tombale who threw in the towel earlier this year, agreed in 2014 to buy 50 percent of Nkomati and 85 percent of Botswana’s Tati Nickel Mining Co. from Norilsk, the world’s biggest producer of the metal, for $337 million. BCL continues to negotiate down how much it has to pay after commodity prices declined and after the transfer of mineral rights in South Africa was delayed. This has yet to be finalised.
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