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Total Tanzania says it has no

plans to exit the country

TANZANIA THE Tanzanian division of France’s Total has each other. The best business decision to make at
denied reports that it is preparing to exit the East that point was to sell some of the property but in
African country, where it has a chain of around short, Total is here in Tanzania to stay,” she told
100 retail filling stations. The Citizen.
Marsha Msuya-Kilewo, the corporate affairs Total Tanzania has had to take similar action
director of Total Tanzania, told The Citizen last in past years, Msuya-Kilewo added. Since the
week that rumours of the company’s possible company finalised the acquisition of Gapco, she
retreat from Tanzania were baseless. The specu- explained, it has unloaded some of that com-
lation appears to have arisen in the wake of Total pany’s storage depots, filling stations and other
Tanzania’s recent announcement of plans to sell assets in order to streamline its business and
some of its retail assets, she said. She stressed, eliminate redundancies.
though, that the company was taking this step “[This] is not the first time that we are sell-
not as a prelude to leaving Tanzania but rather ing some of our property,” she told The Citizen.
within the framework of its asset management “Some months back, we sold some depots that
strategy. used to belong to Gapco in Dar es Salaam.”
Msuya-Kilewo explained that Total Tan- She also indicated that Total Tanzania wanted
zania’s decision stemmed from its acquisition to remain in the country long enough to see
of Gulf Africa Petroleum Corp (Gapco) from the fruits of its investments. The company has
India’s Reliance Industries in 2017. That trans- invested around $200mn in Tanzania over the
action gave the former company control of Gap- last three years and commissioned a $20mn
co’s retail filling stations in Tanzania, Kenya and lubricant plant in Dar es Salaam in 2019, she
Uganda, she said, but it also created a situation stated. Some of the investments went into prom-
in which Total Tanzania’s stations actually found ising upstream and midstream projects, includ-
themselves in competition with Gapco facilities. ing but not limited to the East Africa Crude Oil
As a result, the Total subsidiary is trying to opti- Pipeline (EACOP), she said.
mise its asset portfolio. “All our eyes and energies are now focused
“We reached a point whereby in some loca- on the crude oil pipeline,” Msuya-Kilewo said.™
tions, our service stations were competing with

COAL

Zimbabwe cancels controversial

national park coal licences

ZIMBABWE THE Zimbabwean government has cancelled it has cancelled all mining licences in National
all mining licences in National Parks after public Parks.
protests against two Chinese companies gain- Local media reported that the NGO was told
ing coal explorations licences in the Hwange that the exploration licences had been personally
National Park. approved by Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson
Zhongxin Coal Mining Group and Afrochine Mnangagwa.
Energy, both Chinese owned, were secretly given China is a major investor in Zimbabwe’s
coal-mining licences in 2019. power sector, and the government has plans to
However, a local NGO, Bejane Trust, recently use its 550mn tonnes of coal deposits to become
found a drilling rig in the national park, prompt- a power exporter.
ing waves of public protests. In 2019, a consortium of China’s Power Con-
This led to the Zimbabwe Environmental struction Corp. and US-based General Electric
Law Association and a local resident taking the won the contract for the 2.4-GW Batoka Gorge
matter to court this week, in which they made a HPP on the Zambesi river on the Zambian-Zim-
legal challenge against the granting of Zhongxin babwean border.
Mining Group’s licence. GE and China Power are expected to provide
The government has now announced that the bulk of the $4.5bn funding for the project,

P10 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 36 10•September•2020