Mozambican coal line reopens

The Sena railway line in
Mozambique, which is used
by miners Vale and Rio Tinto,
reopened last Tuesday after
protesters blocked the tracks
for nearly two days.
It’s the only railway
currently available to transport
coal from Tete province to the
port of Beira.
On May 12, 200 brick
makers blocked the line after
their business was resettled by
Vale’s mine. They were asking
the company to compensate
them for the loss of livelihood.
Vale denied that the brick
makers had lost their ability to
make a living.
“Vale believes the
production of bricks in
Moatize has not been
paralysed, and was not
paralysed by the arrival of the
coal mine project in Moatize,”
Vale said in a statement.
It maintained that it had
merely transferred the business
from the mine area to another
space in Moatize, “where it
continues to function fully”,
Vale stated.
Police reportedly arrived to
disperse the crowd in the early
morning hours.
Vale has previously come
under fire from its resettlement
programme in Tete. Many
families there are protesting
that they have no access to
water, power or agricultural
land in their new homes to
which Vale relocated them.
In January last year, more
than 700 Moatize residents
blocked the Sena line because
of anger over resettlements,
preventing the transport of
coal from Rio Tinto’s and
Vale’s mines to Beira.
The latest Sena line
blocking was the second time
services had been suspended
this year. Floods in February
led to the closure of the line,
causing Rio Tinto and Vale to
declare force majeure on their
shipments.