The Sunday News
THE Cold Storage Company (CSC)’s ranches in Matabeleland were on Friday left empty after all their cattle estimated at more than 400 were sold in order to settle unpaid wages and pay off creditors that include the Bulawayo City Council.
The creditors and workers successfully sued the company to pay off outstanding wages and utility bills that date back to more than five years ago.
The cattle were sold in three batches and the Sunday Business witnessed the auctioning of last batch of 50 cattle belonging to the ailing parastatal at CC Sales Auctioneers in Bulawayo.
The auctioning was delayed after the Affirmative Action Group had tried to stop the sale of the cattle.
Most of the auctioned cattle were of poor quality and fetched low prices. The highest priced were sold at about $720 each while the lowest priced was sold at about $270 each.
Last Friday’s auction brought the number of auctioned animals to 420 after about 370 were sold a fortnight ago.
The cattle were taken from the state-owned meat processor’s three ranches in Matabeleland that include Winterblock and Willsgrove.
In interview with Sunday News the Affirmative Action Group (AAG) national vice-president, Mr Sam Ncube, bemoaned the auctioning of the cattle and said efforts to stop the selling of the cattle were unsuccessful.
“We tried to make an urgent application to the court and salvage the few cattle that had been left but the documents that we had could not stop the sale of the cattle. We did an interpleader summon but unfortunately the interpleader summon was not enough to stop the sale because we did not have a court order. We phoned the registrar in Harare who these Deputy Sheriff are answerable to and he was not in agreement with us but we did not have a court order,” said Mr Ncube.
He expressed concern that the money raised from the sale will not be enough to cover the debt.
“It’s an open secret that the money that they are going to recover, most of it is not going to pay the workers but the auctioneer, the transporters, the Sherriff and the lawyers and at the end of the day we are not solving any problem at all. We are just addressing the symptom but not the problem,” he said.
“CSC is trying to build the national herd and be like what it was in the past and I think it is the spirit and wish of every responsible Zimbabwean to see our economy getting back to where it was.
“Yes, CSC was sued by the workers but we are saying there was going to be a way of solving the problem, instead of just selling those cattle. It would be difficult to replace them and it takes a number of years to get those cattle back.
“We cannot watch while public institutions are being plundered by irresponsible people. We are going to demand from the Sherriff on how much was raised from the sale of the cattle.”
He said when they inquired from the CSC management over the selling of the cattle they were told that it was a Government issue.
“The CSC guys were saying what is happening is beyond their control and it’s the Government which is answerable,” the AAG official.
Efforts to get a comment from CSC chief executive officer Mr Ngoni Chinogaramombe were fruitless as his mobile phone rang continuously without being answered.
Deputy Minister of Agriculture in charge of livestock Paddy Zhanda was also not reachable for comment.
CSC’s debts have ballooned to over $25 million from $9 million in 2009, mainly from fixed costs such as wages, rates and taxes on land.
The company has capacity to slaughter 700 000 animals per year but last year it slaughtered 284 000.
CSC was at one time the largest meat processor in Africa, handling up to 150 000 tonnes of beef and associated by-products a year and exporting beef to the European Union, where it had an annual quota of 9 100 tonnes of beef.
The CSC also had a $15 million revolving payment facility with the EU and used to earn Zimbabwe at least $45 million annually.
The firm is now operating at less than 10 percent of capacity, employing 500 workers down from 1 500 in the 1990s.
