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Engineer Thomas Makore

Fairness Moyana, Hwange Correspondent
HWANGE Colliery Company Limited (HCCL) says it is ready to start clearing part of its $350 million debt to different creditors next month under a Scheme of Arrangement after securing $111.5 million treasury bills from Government.

Under the arrangement the company is set to begin paying its workers who have endured 36 months without pay with plans to clear the balance over a period of three years.

Last December the company started paying workers with lower grades who earn $200 each while those earning $400 and above are set to get 50 percent of their outstanding salaries.

Managing director Mr Thomas Makore told a visiting ministerial delegation at the company last week, that the payment plan would start in earnest once Government approves their propositions.

“Government supported our initiatives and gave us treasury bills amounting to $111.5 million, which are basically a loan. The problem is that the debt of $330 million is due today, so the Government extended a longer term loan to us, which we can pay over a 10-15 years. We will convert the treasury bills into cash through the bank and use that to pay our creditors a little bit ‘today’,” said Makore.

“Once we get the ‘Yes vote’ from the creditors in March then we implement the scheme of arrangement as we have planned it. In other words the plan to pay employees over a three-year period the salary backlog must be implemented step by step and every month we have to achieve that.”

He told Mines and Mining Development Minister, Walter Chidhakwa, Speaker of Parliament, Advocate Jacob Mudenda and Senator Thokozile Mathuthu, who is also Deputy Minister of Information, Media and Broadcasting Services, that starting next month, the company will convene a meeting with creditors where representatives will be asked to vote whether they want the proposed Scheme of Arrangement with a ‘yes’ vote benefiting the company in its turnaround initiatives. Mr Makore, however, said a ‘no’ vote would result in the company being placed under judicial management or face liquidation.

“We are going to implement the scheme of arrangement next month and are expecting to get a ‘yes’ vote. The way it works is that we hold a meeting like this one and representatives of creditors are asked to vote after outlining to them how we are going to pay off the debts.

“A ‘no’ vote means that the company goes into liquidation or judicial management and closes down and that’s not good for everyone.”

HCCL has proposed a plethora of interventions to turn around its fortunes such as resuscitation its underground coke mining operations to facilitate exports. The company’s three main underground mines have not been operating since early last year, a development that has cost HCCL millions of dollars.

Hwange Colliery’s success was premised on underground mining where the firm used to get high value coking coal, which it exported to regional markets.