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Lovemore Zigara Midlands Correspondent
A FORMER senior police officer, Apollonia Munzverengwi has been elected the new Zimbabwe Miners Federation (ZMF) president.
He replaces Trynos Nkomo.Munzverengwi is a former Assistant Commissioner and headed the national traffic section.

He is also a miner with interests in gold and chrome. The former traffic cop, who is based in Marondera, has mining concerns mainly in  Shurugwi.

The elections were held at the Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe in Harare last weekend and saw 27 associations in the mining sector seconding 106 people who cast their ballots.

Other members of the new executive include Morgan Moyo who is the first vice-president while Anakileta Gumbo is the second vice-president.

John Chinonzwa will keep the federation’s purse as treasurer while Victor Rupende comes in as the secretary-general.

ZMF public relations officer, Dosman Mangisi said the newly elected executive, whose term ends after three years, has been tasked to superintend the disbursement of the $100 million credit facility from the Chinese Development Bank.

“The newly appointed executive has been appointed for the next three years and their major task will be to ensure that the $100 million loan facility is availed to small scale miners for the purchase of new machinery and equipment to expand production in the sector,” he said.

“The executive has also been tasked with setting up ZMF structures up to district level as well as spearheading and facilitating investment for small scale miners.”

Mangisi said a business entity within the mining federation structures would soon be set up and its mandate would be to come up with ideas for the implementation of mining projects.

ZMF has also made strides in formalising the artisanal miners where over 45,000 miners have so far been incorporated into mining syndicates, a development which has ramped up gold production.

The country aims to triple gold volumes by 2018 from the current 15 tonnes per year to about 48 tonnes per annum.

ZMF has also pioneered gold service centres across the country where some of the equipment can be centrally positioned to help a number of miners to boost gold mining.

One of the gold centres is located in Silobela where about 4,2 kilogrammes was produced in under a month.