Will Chambishi toxic waste spill affect Zambia's ‘all-weather friendship' with China?

Daily Maverick

12-05-2025

Sino Metals' pollution of the Kafue River presents an opportunity to forge a more environmentally sustainable partnership.
When a toxic waste storage facility at a copper processing plant near Chambishi burst on 18 February, about 50 million litres of acidic waste polluted Zambia's Kafue River, which serves as a lifeline for the country.
The plant operator – Sino Metals Leach Zambia – is a Chinese subsidiary of the state-owned China Nonferrous Metal Mining Group. Much has been written about China's controversial track record regarding environmental protection and cavalier attitude towards work safety.
However, the timing and impact of the spillage, and the response it elicited in and outside Zambia, illustrate the convergence of climate risk, industrial governance and diplomatic complexity in Zambia-China relations.
The disaster occurred during Zambia's most severe drought in decades, with average temperatures up 1.3°C since 1960 and rainfall declining by nearly 2mm a month since the 1940s.
The Kafue River sustains 60% of Zambia's population, providing water for drinking, agriculture, fishing and industry, particularly in the Kafue River Basin, where much of Zambia's population lives. Already at its lowest levels in years, the waterway was further compromised, affecting 500,000 residents, contaminating 1,200 hectares of cropland and exacerbating food insecurity for millions.
Site of Zambia's Chambishi toxic spill
This is not an isolated incident but part of a global pattern where climate volatility increases the likelihood and severity of industrial accidents, especially in the extractive sector.
The disaster could challenge the normally cordial Zambia-China relations. Since being formally established in 1964 just after Zambia's independence, state-to-state relations have been characterised by what founding president Kenneth Kaunda described as an 'all-weather' friendship. Mining investments now constitute more than 88% of total Chinese investments in Zambia – Africa's second-largest copper-producing nation.
The spillage has attracted international scrutiny. US Africa Command chief Michael Langley cited the accident in his testimony before Congress as an example of the ills of Chinese investment compared with the American model.
Zambia's struggle with corruption in the early 2000s and its heavy reliance on copper exports made attracting foreign direct investment challenging. China's readiness to engage in this difficult economic and political environment offered a valuable alternative to Western financing, which often required political and social reforms.
However, as China's involvement deepened, the relationship became more complex. For example, a year before Zambia's 2006 general election, an explosion at a Chinese-run explosives manufacturing plant in Chambishi killed dozens of Zambian workers amid labour abuse allegations. It provided fodder for Michael Sata, populist leader of the Patriotic Front – which went on to become the main opposition party – who criticised Lusaka's close ties with Beijing.
Despite occasional enforcement actions in response to public outcries, Zambian officials frequently soft-pedal Chinese mining companies that bypass environmental and safety standards, with repeated reports of violations and inadequate labour conditions. As Institute for Security Studies research shows, this is part of a broader trend of weak judicial oversight, allowing Chinese firms considerable impunity in their operations.
Twenty years later, disaster has again struck Chambishi, a year before Zambians head to the polls. This time however, the incident seems to have affected state-to-state diplomacy. More than just criticising Sino Metals, Zambian opposition parties are holding the government partly responsible, accusing it of allowing substandard tailings dams to operate, and calling for farmer compensation.
Considering the country's current economic woes and political flux, the last thing President Hakainde Hichilema's beleaguered government needs is to alienate prospective voters by not condemning the incident. Hichilema described the acidic runoff as a 'crisis' – and officials airdropped tonnes of lime into the river to ameliorate the pollution.
International precedents provide valuable lessons for Zambia. The 2014 Mount Polley tailings dam collapse released millions of cubic metres of mining waste into Canada's Quesnel Lake. British Columbia responded by banning upstream dam construction, mandating independent safety reviews, and establishing a $1.3-billion remediation fund, with the mining company carrying most costs.
Similarly, Brazil's 2019 Brumadinho disaster killed 270 people, prompting the introduction of real-time monitoring of high-risk dams, community evacuation plans, and a $7-billion reparation settlement from Vale S.A. for ecosystem restoration.
These cases show the importance of robust regulatory frameworks, corporate accountability and transparent monitoring measures that can help prevent future disasters and ensure effective responses.
Zambia's 2024 Green Economy and Climate Change Act offers a policy foundation to address these interconnected risks. The government can mandate climate stress-testing of mining infrastructure, drawing on the Southern African Development Community's projections of a 1.8°C to 3.6°C temperature rise by 2050. It can also adopt real-time monitoring for high-risk dams, like in Brazil.
Regionally, strengthening transboundary water governance through the SADC Transboundary Water Management Programme can help establish joint water quality standards with Zimbabwe and Mozambique, mitigating cross-border impacts.
Internationally, enforcing the Equator Principles for social and environmental management – mainly for firms in the extractive industries – which Chinese investors in Zambia were reluctant to sign, should be prioritised.
Diplomatically, the Chambishi spillage has intensified scrutiny of both Chinese investment and the Zambian government's regulatory resolve before the 2026 polls. The government's response has been reactive rather than proactive.
To restore public trust and diplomatic credibility, Zambia must move beyond rhetoric and do what previous incumbents have shirked. It must hold foreign investors accountable and embed climate resilience and environmental safeguards into future agreements. It also needs to recalibrate its relationship with China on terms that prioritise safety, sustainability and national interest.
This will test Zambia's diplomatic dexterity, which has so far served it well, such as when Lusaka maintained trade relations with the West while strongly condemning Western vacillations on apartheid South Africa and minority-ruled Rhodesia.
Currently, Chinese state-owned and private enterprises and individual Chinese entrepreneurs ply their trade outside their government's auspices. Even Chinese state-owned enterprises, such as Sino Metals, prioritise profit over environmental responsibility, a far cry from the Kaunda era when ideology seemed to hold sway.
Lusaka must candidly address its evolving relations with Beijing, lest it alienate itself from the many Zambians who suffer the impacts of disasters such as Chambishi. DM