Times Of Swaziland: E130M FOR SWAZI CITY FEASIBILTY, ENVIRONMENTAL STUDY

E130M FOR SWAZI CITY FEASIBILTY, ENVIRONMENTAL STUDY
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BY KWANELE DHLADHLA on 10/01/2018 08:25:00


MBABANE – Changing the face of King Mswati III International Airport is on
course as approximately E130 million (US$100 million) has been secured for
pre-construction processes to commence.
This was disclosed by Director for Swazi based Pearl of the South Mfunwa Lukhele
yesterday. He said all correspondence and relevant approval had been received
giving the processing of the E130 million into the kingdom for commencement of
what he termed ‘groundwork’. Lukhele said by February, they expected the
funds to have been deposited into the country, for collation of documents that
include, but not limited to, feasibility and environmental studies that would
lay the groundwork and give direction how the project ought to be rolled out.
“The project is going ahead. I may not be certain as to how much will be sent
through for now but we had budgeted about E130 million (US$100 million) for
groundwork,” said Lukhele.
The amount to be released for the groundwork, is part of the mega-project where
E52 billion could be invested towards construction of the Swazi City. The
multibillion projects, where over 3000 jobs could be created soon after
Environmental Impact Assessment EIA approval, could be constructed courtesy of
an international joint venture group involving Sellbridge International, a UK
organisation run by African born philanthropist TM Hart-Jones and Pearl of the
South (Shaking the Tree Foundation). Pearl of the South Managing Director Tim
Smith previously said the three major projects would include the creation of a
Trade Free Zone with a five star hotel and casino a world class concert arena
(with plans to bring in top booking artists and world class entertainers in all
areas of music), a bonded warehouse, an international mineral bank, a sovereign
finance and banking district including offshore banking and possibly a stock
exchange also a manufacturing zone, to bring in foreign entrepreneurs to
manufacture their goods in Swaziland.
The funding could also include plans to assist Swaziland to develop a new Green
Smart Town / City in the region, with all services and transport infrastructure.
The project could also extend to include a totally funded 400MW power station
powered by Swaziland Anthracite in two ways, near to the Mpaka area with the
budget to open a fully functional coal mining operation. Smith disclosed that
they recently had meetings with highly placed officials to advance the planned
Sikhuphe Airport infrastructure development project. Smith said Sellbridge and
Pearl of South had aligned themselves accordingly with Dene Tribes and Sovereign
Bank of Dene for the Swaziland mega projects, representing Global Indigenous
communities on the expansion of self-sustainability and Green infrastructure as
well as a bio-friendly formatted zero-waste smart City development at a
macro-economic level. He explained that Dene Tribes and Sellbridge Ltd/Pearl of
South had arranged a strategic technological partnership with GHBH - Global
Human Benefit Holdings of Hong Kong as a part of the World Help - Africa
initiative.