Man Friday: Lower Zambezi on borrowed time as mining gets the nod

First published by Die Burger

The Zambezi is an extraordinary river. Along its many byways, it is home to arguably the greatest collection of wildlife in Africa.

It begins life as a tiny stream in Zambia, then flows into Angola to be joined by Rio Luena and Rio Chifumage. It twists back into Zambia and meets the Luanginga, the Lungwebungwe, the Kabompo and multiple smaller streams and spreads out on the Barotse Floodplain before narrowing and tumbling over the Ngonye Falls on its way to Kazungula in Botswana.

There it is joined by the Chobe, the river that began life as the Cuando in Angola, before gathering itself for Victoria Falls. Then it compresses through the spectacular Batoka Gorge (soon to be destroyed by a dam) before gliding past the shores of Matusadona and the Sanyati Gorge on Lake Kariba.

Between the wall of Kariba, and before entering Lago de Cahora Bassa in Mozambique, it is joined by two more great African rivers – the Kafue and the Luangwa.

Between the Kafue and the Luangwa lies what connoisseurs will tell you is one of Africa’s special places – on the Zimbabwean bank, Mana Pools; on the Zambian bank, Lower Zambezi National Park.

It is a special kind of wilderness, a place that becomes too hot, wet, humid and malarial for tourists in the rainy season. Even so, Lower Zambezi is now Zambia’s third most popular tourism destination after South Luangwa National Park and Victoria Falls.

If you’ve never been there, you’ll recognise the area instantly from photographs of Mana elephants on their hind legs in the dust plucking pods from Ana trees. Or of lions ganging on the back of a buffalo. Elephants crossing the Zambezi, just their trunks sticking out the water as they walk-swim across the border. A leopard in the dappled forest of winterthorn as the Old Mondoro track meanders through Lower Zambezi.

The valley has been through tough times: battles were fought there between Zipra guerrillas and Rhodesian soldiers in the bush war. Poachers hammered the valley in the mass slaughter of Africa’s rhino and elephant in the 1980s and 1990s.

Now there is peace in the valley.

Nine years ago, an elusive mining company, Mwembeshi Resources, alternately described as registered in Australia, Bermuda or Dubai, now allegedly taken over by a Chinese company, filed papers to licence the Kangaluwi Copper Project. There is a long and complex history of corruption, flouted processes and disregard of environmental law.

The short version is: Mwembeshi will mine copper in the middle of Lower Zambezi National Park.

On 17 October, the Zambian High Court ruled that the appeal against the mine had been incompetently filed, and Mwembeshi could go ahead. We can kiss Lower Zambezi and Mana Pools goodbye.

Now is the time for the international community to step in and tell the Zambian government the law is an ass. Tell them that wilderness, and a sense of place, are more important than transient robber-barons who don’t care what they leave behind.

And if that means pissing off Africa’s new colonisers, so what? Mana and Lower Zambezi are too precious to sacrifice for a mess of potage. DM