RE: MDA18 Mar 2024 09:13
Malawi is as Malawi does
We all thought originally we were investing an a stable landscape however the last few years have really hammered Malawi hard, from the cyclone and of course inflation due to mass QE and 'all at once' re-openings.
The ministry are taking as much time as they can with these MDA's, for reasons unknown. At first we they blamed the Paladin deal, to never happen again, however Songwe et al could all have been looking at production in the next 9 months if they had agreed terms early on. Now it's going to be at least 2 years, maybe longer as the investment landscape has collapsed, arranging finance will be much more difficult today than it was in 2022 - so Malawi has truly missed the boat, well at least the first boat and we do hope another comes along. The sad thing is, its the locals that suffer the most whilst the politicians make it look like they are playing hardball, but where do you draw the line between hardball (a country that has devalued its currency and been bailed out by the IMF) and investors who want to progress mining operations on your territory and take all the financial risk?
Hence, MKA should be in no rush to begin operations, the investment has zero value on the books and is simply an ongoing cost that we should mitigate as much as possible.