The boxes of families in bikita were Axepep when the trucks arrived. With the cover of darkness, the surveyors of a foreign mining firm, flanked by local officials, placed red flags in a line that would later become a perimeter fence. In a matter of days, the fields of the villagers, some cultivated during generations, were declared part of a lithium mining area. No one had seen an environmental impact assessment. No one had compensated the leg.
“They cool us a week to leave,” said Tendai Mudzamiri, 52, standing next to the ruins of what used to be his home. “They said it was legal. But nobody here signed anything.”
The world needs lithium. It is essential to clean energy, electric vehicles and battery storage. But as a several months investigation for The Eastern Herald It reveals that the human and environmental costs of that transition are being buried in silence.
Land seizures with government consent
The internal documents of the Council, the acquisition archives and complaints of the local court obeyed by East Herald show that between 2022 and 2024, more than 3,200 hectares of rural lands were tested without parliamentary review. Much of this went to Chinese property companies that operated through capricious entities on the high seas. In some districts, the land was transferred through unpublished executive orders, avoiding the constitutional requirement of Zimbabwe for public consultation.
The residents of the provinces of Masvingo and Midlands described intimidation tactics. Some were threatened with police action if they refused to vacation. In three verified cases, the families that resisted were later accused of drawing a land that had legally belonged to them during generations.
“They build vallas first, then they are notified later,” said Nokuthula Denga, 63, whose family complex in Zvishavane was razed.
Human Rights Watch has marked the growing use of evictions backed by the state disguised as infrastructure expansion.
The money path: Where are lithium riches go
A forensic audit obtained from a senior official of the Zimbabwe’s income authority, not authorized to speak publicly, reveals that above all $ 1.1 billion in lithium -related profits left Zimbabwe between the third quarter of 2022 and the fourth quarter of 2025 – Enruted through intermediate companies in Hong Kong and Mauricio. These structures avoid retaining taxes and dark property.
The presentations of the company reviewed by Eastern Herald show that Sinomine Resource Group, which controls the Bikita mine, declared $ 620 million in revenue in 2024, but only paid 4.8% in government royaltiesWell below 15%legal. The diverse was justified through confidential bilateral investment funds, none of which has discussed in the leg in Parliament.
“This was legalized,” said a former official of the Ministry of Finance. “We are seeing that our national resources vaporize in balances abroad.”
Environmental destruction, undoclanted and unpunished
In coordination with the analysis of Zimbabwe and Drone of Earth Rights carried out by Geolab of the University of Cape, the Eastern Herald documented 18 mining lithium areas through Masvingo and Manicaland and showing signs of: interruption of the aquifer, Chamical unregulated.
Water samples collected independently by two confirmed regional laboratories Toxic levels of arsenic lithium compounds, lead and suspended On the tributaries that feed on the Save and Rivers rivers, both essential for later agricultural communities.
Despite these findings, the Environmental Management Agency has not published a single audit report for lithium operations since the late 2021. The agency did not respond to three formal interview requests.
The unemployed sit off the doors
Using filtered employment lists of two lithium operations administered by Chinese and interviews on the site with approximately 40 workers, the Eastern Herald discovered that Only 13.7% of the technical roles were held by the Zimbabuense nationals. Most were occupied by engineers imported from the provinces of Yunnan and Sichuan in China.
Multiple graduates of the Department of Geology of the University of Zimbabwe confirmed that despite the application, they never registered in their place by foreign contractors of lower cost under approvals of general work visas.
“We educate, then we exclude,” said Dr. Nyasha Bvute, president of the Faculty of Earth Sciences of the University.
Western beneficiaries, east enablers
While Chinese companies extract, western brands benefit. Tesla, Volkswagen, byd: All depend on the supply chains that date back to southern Africa. However, due diligence remains greatly absent. The 2024 Human Rights Watch report identified Zimbabwe as a “blind compliance point” in the Global Marcos of ESG, citing systemic gaps in transparency and protections of human rights in the country’s mining sector.
Additional investigations of Global Witness confirm that the trouble for ensuring the supplies of Africa lithium, including Zimbabwe, has created mature conditions for corruption, the lack of corporate responsibility and weakened the minimum scrutiny of the tourist protections of the shooting envonms on their origin or impact.
The EU critical raw materials law, although it is considered a regulatory milestone, does not impose concrete supervision on supply practices unless minerals are processed within the EU block. Indeed, what is extracted in Zimbabwe and refined in China is Legally invisible To the western scrutiny.
“Everyone benefits from this model, except Zimbabwe,” said Dr. Arfa Iqbal, a policy analyst in Nairobi. “It is designed not to leave digital footprints.”
In April 2025, the Zimbabwe government announced plans for a lithium refinery outside Harare, partial founded by a Chinese consortium. But documents reviewed by the Eastern Herald Show There are no binding clauses for local employment, environmental supervision or income exchange.
Meanwhile, schools near the mining areas remain insufficient. Health clinics lack current water. The roads built for access to the mine have torn through cultivation lands, creating sudden flooding channels duration of the rainy season.
“They told us that this was progress,” said Rufaro Chihota, a teacher. “But if this is progress, why do we feel erased?”
What the data shows
- 3,200+ hectares o Rural land reused since 2022
- <5% Real average paid by lithium companies
- 67% Inemployment youth despite the mining increase
- 0 Environmental audits published since 2022
- 18 documented sites O Non -regulated environmental impact
- More than $ 1.1 billion In mineral wealth exported through structures on the high seas
Not a tree. A transfer.
Zimbabwe’s lithium fever is not a national rebirth. It’s a Wealth and risk transfer – From the poorest to the richest, from the south to the north. Behind each “sustainable battery” that drives western economies is a trace of opaque contracts, displaced families, contaminated rivers and communities abandoned by their own government.
The transition to clean energy should not be built on the erase of future Africans. But in Zimbabwe, it is already.
This investigation is part of the discovered series of Eastern Herald’s Africa and occurred for a period of four months with contributions from field correspondents in Masvingo, legal investigators in Harare, satellite analysts of South Africa and complainants.
