Indian investor building Afreximbank complex accused of discrimination

📅 Published: August 26, 2025

Curated by AllZimNews.com

The groundbreaking ceremony was held in September 2022.

The centre will house the bank’s regional office, a world class hotel, a tech incubation lab, a trade information centre and a conference facility when completed.

Zhou had engaged the Indian company to be considered as one of the Afreximbank project engineers and was advised that he was too old to be hired.

Instead, according to him, the company sought his services as a consultant who would scout for firms that Shapoorji Pallonji planned to contract but none of them got the job.

Zhou reportedly established that the contracts had, instead, been awarded to Indian firms under unclear circumstances, a development that led the engineer to conclude that the Shapoorji Pallonji management in Zimbabwe had practiced favouritism by excluding Zimbabwean and other companies he had suggested as a consultant. “Companies I had shortlisted for jobs at Shapoorji Pallonji kept phoning me, asking whether or not they had been shortlisted for contracts, but when I made a follow up with the management, I was told they had already given the contracts to Indian companies. “Even the president (Emmerson Mnangagwa) brags about this country being built by its own people.

That’s not what is happening in reality,” Zhou toldNewsHub.

He accused public officials tasked with licensing foreign companies of soliciting for and receiving bribes to circumvent local competitors. “The one who says the country is built by its owners is the president.

His people on the ground love money and they are bribed to let foreign firms employ workers from their countries, leaving the locals jobless,” alleged Zhou, who in 2019 returned from Namibia where he had worked as a mechanical engineer in the ministry of Works and Transport.

The Indian ambassador to Zimbabwe, Rungsung Masakui, dismissed Zhou’s allegation of favouritism at Shapoorji Pallonji, insisting that most of the employees were locals. “It’s not true that they (Shapoorji Pallonji) are getting their labour from India.

In fact, there is no labour from India.

Some engineers, or management staff, only the top level, five to 10 percent is there.

There is only minimal management and engineers from India,” Masakui toldNewsHub.

The Indian embassy urged Zimbabweans affected by the alleged favouritism to seek legal recourse. 🔗

” style=”color: #007bff;”>admin@allzimnews. com.