Looted Minerals Leave Zimbabwean Communities in Ruin

Zimbabwe’s mineral wealth is looted through opaque deals, leaving communities in Chiadzwa, Marange and Penhalonga impoverished and polluted (image source)

Communities across Mashonaland and Manicaland are reeling as Zimbabwe’s vast mineral wealth—diamonds, gold and chrome—is siphoned off through opaque deals, leaving towns like Chiadzwa, Marange and Penhalonga scarred and impoverished. Deputy Minister Kudakwashe David Mnangagwa warns that illicit financial flows (IFFs) drain Africa of an estimated US$88 billion annually—funds that should build schools, clinics and roads.

The scale of looting is stark. In Chiadzwa, diamond tunnels crisscross beneath homesteads; in Kwekwe, land is so hollowed out the central business district risks collapse. Villagers recall unfulfilled promises: no new clinics, no potable water systems, only dust and derelict infrastructure. “Our wealth vanishes while our children go hungry,” one Marange resident said.

Experts say weak oversight and political patronage fuel the crisis. Farai Maguwu, executive director of the Centre for Natural Resource Governance, laments that smuggling along porous borders costs Zimbabwe up to US$1 billion in lost mineral revenue each year. “Companies arrive to extract, not to invest — they leave behind poisoned rivers and broken communities,” he said.

“Zimbabwe’s mineral endowment has been captured by a system that benefits a few, not many,”Farai Maguwu, Centre for Natural Resource Governance

Surveys by the Zimbabwe Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) reveal no meaningful royalties reach local councils, and state auditors report that contracts routinely bypass competitive tendering. Environmental assessments are ignored, allowing cyanide and heavy metals to poison waterways. Farmers in Mazowe now sell cattle for as little as US$100 after livestock die from contaminated water.

Zimbabwe’s mining boom began in earnest with the discovery of alluvial diamonds in Marange in 2006. Initial hype promised community trusts, new hospitals and employment. Instead, state security forces and politically connected cartels sealed exclusive rights, relegating locals to menial jobs and beggary. A 2016 parliamentary inquiry flagged irregular share transfers and unsecured state loans to major players, but its recommendations were never implemented.

Calls for reform grow louder. Civil society groups urge enforcement of the Minerals Marketing Corporation Act (2021) to mandate transparent deals, and propose community benefit agreements requiring a percentage of profits be invested within mining districts. Local NGO Transparency International Zimbabwe also recommends mobile legal clinics to help villagers file complaints and secure reparations.

As platinum and lithium demand soars globally, Zimbabwe stands at a crossroads. Without concrete action to disrupt entrenched patronage networks and enforce transparency, communities will watch their ancestral lands hollowed out for the enrichment of a powerful few. The government must prioritize binding contracts, routine audits and genuine community engagement—or risk cementing decades of extraction with no return for its citizens.