Zambia suspends metal export permits

Newly-elected president, Michael Sata, has been concerned - analysts say with good reason - about copper exporters misreporting the amount of ore leaving the country, and last week said that henceforth all export payments would have to be routed via the Central Bank.

The suspension of permits is another sign of Sata's administration acting quickly on its populist campaign promises. "All current permits issued by my ministry are immediately suspended pending issuance of new guidelines by the government," Godwin Beene, the permanent secretary at the ministry said in the document, dated October 4 and seen by Reuters.