DRC Finance Minister Nicolas Kazadi Refutes Deputy Alfred Maicha’s Allegations on Primera RDC

The Minister of Finance of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Nicolas Kazadi, rejected outright the allegations of the national deputy Alfred Maicha on the Primera RDC file.

Facing media professionals during the briefing organized on Monday August 28, 2023, Minister Kazadi explained that the creation of the Primera RDC joint venture is part of the high-level strategy for a dual objective: both to recover economic sovereignty , but also to fight against the mining fraud which fuels the armed conflicts in the East of the country.

While refuting the existence of any exclusivity of gold exports that would be granted to Primera Gold, Nicolas Kazadi rather specified that the contract signed between the two parties provides for the signing of a Decree.

According to this Decree, a marketing and export center will have to be created and will remain an entity entirely under the control of the Congolese State.

“The lawyer who is also an MP who defended a certain exclusivity granted to Primera should study his case sufficiently. This contract also provides for the signing of a Decree and he omitted to present this decree. You do not find any form of exclusivity given to Primera for the gold ore export chain. 

This Decree provides instead for the creation of a marketing and export center which is an entity of the Congolese State. “, declared Nicolas Kazadi.

When the time comes, he assured, the Congolese State will entrust the management of this marketing center to whomever it wishes subject to annual performance evaluation.

“Our country has been a victim of the mafia. It should be noted that there is a conflict of interest (the fact of being a Member of Parliament and a lawyer for the incriminated companies). it gets messy. CONGO COM, of which he is a lawyer, is being sued today. The file is under investigation at the level of the competent authorities. “, he noted.

According to Minister Nicolas Kazadi, CONGO COM declared barely 15 kilos of gold in 2022.

On the other hand, information from the Congolese Government indicates a volume of 3.4 tonnes of gold that the incriminated company would have exported to Rwanda. This causes, according to Nicolas Kazadi, a shortfall of around 1 billion dollars for the year 2022 alone.