Posts in category: Uncategorized

 A 28-year-old man of Lusaka has been detained in police custody for attempting to sexually abuse a 15-year-old girl who was on her way to school. The victim , a grade eight pupil at a named school, is said to have been dragged by Charles Ngonga into a maize field where he attempted to have […]

The statistics come to be one in 33 people affected by the condition, which is more common than the one in 40 people estimate, earlier believed to be true.

By NATION REPORTER

GOVERNMENT has scaled down structure of the Lusaka-Ndola Dual Carriage way road construction project which was originally expected to cost around US$2 billion with all the amenities including the creation of Townships, Hotels and other highway economic infrastructures.

Government yesterday signed a Public Private Partnership (PPP) Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Avic International for the construction of the Lusaka-Ndola Dual Carriage Way at a cost of US$577 million.

The initial structure of the Lusaka-Ndola Dual Carriage Way had included other economic infrastructure such as Satelite Cities, three toll Plazas along the route, Road Development Agency (RDA) offices, a bypass road from Kapiri Mposhi to avoid passing through the central business district, a bridge across the Mulungushi River and three service stations along the project road as well as the construction of the Luanshya/ Masangano Bridge among others.

The MoU signed yesterday is without the above mentioned additional economic infrastructure which has seen the reduction of the total cost of the Lusaka-Ndola Dual Carriage Way to no more than US$577 million.

Infrastructure Minister Charles Milupi claimed yesterday that had the Patriotic Front continued in government after the 2021 general elections, government was going to lose more than US$2 billion in the project because according to him, it was largely overpriced.

He said the total cost of construction of the 327 Km dual carriage way under the PPP project would be US$577 million.

Mr Milupi said this during the signing ceremony for the Lusaka-Ndola dual carriageway in Ndola yesterday.

And Minister of Finance and National planning, Situmbeko Musokotwane has said for the first time since independence, the country was witnessing the construction of a dual carriage way of such a magnitude at a true value of the cost.

Dr. Musokotwane said a few years ago, there was an attempt by the previous government to construct the same road but they did not succeed as it was overpriced.

He said the government did not proceed with the project because of the public uproar because the country was borrowing huge sums of money for the construction of the road.

“They wanted to borrow more than $1.2 billion for the construction of the road which was overpriced,” he said.

Dr. Musokotwane said under the PPP project the government was not going to spend not even a single penny or borrow any money for the construction of this most important economical road.

He said he was aware that the of progress would try to throw mud on the progress made by using PPP by purporting that the government would have built the roads themselves rather than using local institutions.

Dr. Musokotwane said the government was not going to lose revenue through this partnership because it would be key participants in the revenues that would be collected from the roads.

He said critics were saying that this was not a PPP project because the government was getting financing from local intuitions like NAPSA but the local institution was not financing the whole project.

Dr. Musokotwane said it was better for the money to come from inside so that when the money was being paid back everything would remain in the country.

“The interest that will be earned by NAPSA would be in turn earned by the owners of NAPSA who are the people of Zambia,” he said.

He also said the concession period of the project was 25 years split in two, three years of construction and 22 years of operations and maintenance. 

Dr. Musokotwane said as the contractor has already indicated that the construction of the road would take approximately 36 months, the benefits of this road would spur development not only in this country but the southern region as a whole.

“For the first time, we showed that the more vapers used e-cigarettes, and the longer they used them, the more DNA damage occurred in their oral cells,” study author Ahmad Besaratinia and his colleagues at Keck School of Medicine of USC, said.

By NATION REPORTER

IT is going to be risky for government to consider bringing back Vedanta to run Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) because rumours are swelling that the firm may be having financial challenges, Patriots for Economic Progress (PeP) president Sean Tembo has said.

Mr Tembo said that it was going to be suicide if government allowed Vedanta to return because the firm was facing a number of challenges and looking at the way it conducted itself the same would happen.

“My plea is that government should not entertain the return of Vedanta because history is there for us to see, contractors were not paid plus other problems that were faced during its run at KCM,” he said.

Meanwhile, Anil Agarwal’s once-London-listed Vedanta Resources Limited has a pile of debt, including a $1 billion bond due January.

However, Vedanta Resources did manage to shed its net-debt burden from almost $10 billion in March last year to a little under $8 billion. With the listed unit declaring a dividend last month, its parent and majority shareholder is “highly likely” to meet its obligations until September 2023, according to S&P Global Inc. So far so good. But it was when Agarwal tried to secure the finances for $1.5 billion in loan and bond repayments between September this year and January 2024 that he hit a roadblock. 

What was supposed to be a quick dash to the ATM has become an uncertain enough adventure for Vedanta Resources bondholders to drive the price of the August 2024 note below 70 cents on the dollar. The next few weeks will be crucial for fundraising. If it fails, the issuer’s B- credit rating, already deep in the junk-bond category, could come under pressure, S&P said this month. Adani’s net debt pile of $24 billion may be three times as large as Agarwal’s, but his bonds are still rated at the lowest rung of investment grade. 

What happened to get everyone worried was this: Hindustan Zinc Ltd., which Agarwal had started buying from the Indian government two decades ago in a privatization deal, has a cash pile, albeit much smaller than before, of $2 billion. Plus, the miner garners between $300 million and $600 million Ebitda (1) every quarter. So Vedanta Ltd., which now owns 65% of the firm, decided in January to offload THL Zinc Ltd. Mauritius to Hindustan Zinc. That cash deal, representing mining interests in South Africa and Namibia, was valued at roughly $3 billion in phases over 18 months. Since Vedanta Ltd. is 70% owned by Vedanta Resources, it would have taken care of the latter’s liquidity needs.

Except there was one problem. New Delhi, which still owns about 30% of Hindustan Zinc, balked at the transaction. 

“We would urge the company to explore other cashless methods for acquisition of these assets,” the Indian government said in a Feb. 17 letter, threatening to explore legal avenues if Hindustan Zinc still decided to go ahead with the purchase.

This presents two problems for the mining magnate. First, unless China’s economic revival turns things around, the post-pandemic era of supernormal commodity profits could be over. If Agarwal can’t take Hindustan Zinc’s cash all the way up to his privately held Vedanta Resources, his ability to pay down debt may be impaired, forcing him to borrow more. But with the Fed giving no indication that it’s done raising rates and existing Vedanta Resources bonds dropping in value, he might struggle to raise fresh money at a reasonable cost.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said Tuesday his agency believes the Covid-19 pandemic was “most likely” caused by an incident in a laboratory in Wuhan, China.

Long partial to heavy lunchtime platters of meat and rice, Asim al-Shammari has recently turned to lighter fare from a self-described diet restaurant, swayed by Saudi Arabia’s anti-obesity push.

Mississippi residents might get back the ability to enact public policy through statewide ballot initiatives, but people would be banned from using the process to change abortion laws.

According to the outlet, an average human ingests and inhales about 5 g of MNPs a week, which is equivalent to the mass of a credit card. 

Covid-19 vaccine maker Novavax raised doubts Tuesday about its ability to continue its business, announcing plans to cut spending after struggles in rolling out its coronavirus jab.