By Alessandra Galloni
DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) – Botswana’s new president, Douma Boko, said on Thursday he hoped to soon conclude a long-delayed diamond sales deal with Anglo American (JO:) subsidiary De Beers.
Boko said in an interview with Reuters NEXT Newsmaker at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that his government agreed with De Beers on most issues and that there was no longer any than “tidying up”.
“I hope it will be tomorrow. I mean it literally,” Boko said, when asked about when the government planned to sign the sale agreement.
Botswana, the world’s largest diamond producer by value, and De Beers agreed to a new sales deal in 2023, but it was never signed under Boko’s predecessor, Mokgweetsi Masisi.
Boko scored a shock electoral victory late last year, when voters in the southern African country expelled the party that had governed them for almost six decades.
Botswana holds a 15% stake in De Beers and is trying to increase the share of rough diamonds it gets from its joint venture with the company.
Anglo American is considering selling off De Beers as part of a broader restructuring of its sprawling operations, and Boko on Thursday reiterated Botswana’s position that it could increase its stake in De Beers.
“We are looking to see if we can get a larger share of De Beers, and that is also subject to negotiation,” he said.
Botswana’s diamond-dependent economy is expected to have contracted last year due to a sharp slowdown in the global diamond market, but authorities are hoping for a rebound this year.