Zimbabwe To Revive Ailing Firms

Zimbabwe To Revive Ailing Firms

Zimbabwe says it plans to turn around 10 struggling state firms before the end of this year, under a revived privatisation drive. The move was to attract foreign investors.

State Enterprises minister, Gorden Moyo said Zimbabwe was determined to change the fortunes of government firms, many of them notorious for shoddy services, perennial financial losses, gross mismanagement and corruption.

Moyo said the government had recently approved a new programme to restructure, commercialise and privatise at least 1 0 companies and had received interest from foreign investors.

In his words, ''We have a number of investors, locally, regionally, internationally, from the west, from the east, north and south, who are all making inquiries and are all making statements of interest in our public entities…The public entities in Zimbabwe have the potential to contribute over 40 per cent to our GDP, and they can contribute to market capitalisation as well as employment.'' Moyo said in an interview on Monday.

Targeted firms include the Grain Marketing Board (GMB), National Railways of Zimbabwe, fixed phone company TelOne and mobile phone operator NetOne, AgriBank and Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company (Zisco).

Others are the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe , power utility ZESA, Air Zimbabwe and beef producer, Cold Storage Company (CSC).

Details of strategic partners will soon unveil

Moyo said details would be available by year-end, but added that government had identified a strategic partner for beef producer CSC.

The grain board would be split into a commercial and social unit, handling grain management and strategic food reserves.

''The government was ‘at an advanced stage' of choosing a foreign investor for Zisco, we want to determine whether we privatise or we commercialise or we restructure in general,'' Moyo said.

The government solely controls in 78 corporations known locally as parastatals, in sectors such as energy, transport, finance, mining and telecommunications.

A unity government formed by rivals President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai last year is battling to fix an economy hit by hyperinflation.

NAN/Yinka