It’s a real fairy tale that Saniniu Kuryan Laizer has just lived: professional breeder, miner in his spare time, he accidentally discovered two enormous fragments of tanzanite, a precious stone particularly rare and very appreciated in jewelry. The government bought them nearly three million euros from their happy owner…
The discovery turned his life upside down. Aged 52, this cow breeder had lived a rather modest life until then; like many Tanzanians, he sometimes tried to find the precious mineral in the hills of Merelani, in the region of Manyara. Luck ended up smiling at him. With the money from the sale of stones, he plans to contribute to the development of his local community, in particular by financing the construction of a shopping center and a school near his home.
An ore with rare properties
Tanzanite is a variety of zoisite – a mineral species belonging to the group of silicates – blue to purple in color. It was discovered for the first time in Tanzania, in 1967, by a Maasai shepherd, not far from Mount Kilimanjaro. This stone is very appreciated by jewelers because of its pleochroism: the mineral absorbs different wavelengths according to the angle of illumination, which gives it reflections with multiple colors (blue, purple or dark red in this case).
Rough stone and cut stone of tanzanite, an ore highly prized by jewelers for its different colored reflections. Credits: Wikimedia Commons / Didier Descouens
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This stone is very rare; a carat sells for between 600 and 800 dollars. The only deposits are located in Tanzania – hence its name, chosen by the American jeweler Tiffany, who hastened to appropriate the stone as soon as it was discovered – in the hills of Merelani, in the north of the country, near the city of Arusha. These mines produce more than a million carats each year. The rough stones are generally exported, to be cut in India. They are very popular with the upper African, Indian and American bourgeoisie.
The two fragments unearthed by Saniniu Kuryan Laizer weigh 9.27 and 5.1 kg respectively. They were discovered in the mountains of Merelani, in the north of Tanzania, in an area that the president, John Magufuli, had surrounded by a wall in 2018 to better control production (and fight against illegal exports of the mineral). Today, Magufuli is delighted ” that minerals benefit ordinary local people ».
The tanzanite fragments discovered by Saniniu Kuryan Laizer. Credits: TBC
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According to Doto Biteko, Tanzanian Minister of Mines, these are the largest stones ever discovered in the country. An exceptional event, given that the small miners are for the most part ill-equipped to discover such fragments, which usually are found at depths that only large mining companies can reach. If the government has decided to buy these rare minerals, it is mainly to prevent large private companies or traffickers from taking them. He said on Twitter that the stones would be kept at the national museum.
Traffic difficult to eradicate
Because despite the rarity and success of tanzanite, it has not really benefited its country of origin. As is often the case on the African continent, the benefits derived from underground resources hardly benefit the territories from which they come … Jumanne Ngoma, the shepherd who discovered the mineral for the first time, thus remained poor all his life. It was not until 2018 that the old man was finally declared “national hero” by President Magufuli, who rewarded him with a donation of around $ 44,000.
For several years, the main tanzanite mine was controlled by South African, then British companies, while being the site of significant illegal traffic. Since coming to power in late 2015, Magufuli has been fighting with the big foreign mining companies operating on the spot, accused of having undervalued their production of gold, diamonds and tanzanite (while the minerals were exported and then sold in the whole world with a strong added value). An “error” which means a significant shortfall for the country, estimated at several tens of billions of dollars in taxes and royalties since 1998.
In 2010, gross tanzanite generated annual sales of $ 20 million. However, according to Wall Street Journal, the United States sold at the time more than 350 million dollars of tanzanite each year, in the form of cut stones set in jewelry! When the decision was made to erect a 24-kilometer wall around the Merelani mines in 2018, the head of government estimated that 40% of the national production of tanzanite was smuggled. The initiative was successful: in three months, the state collected $ 313,000 in taxes, as much as in the past three years.
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The site is now in the hands of Tanzanite One, a semi-public, semi-private company, financed by exclusively Tanzanian capital; the company holds 35% of the deposit, while the remaining 65% is intended for local miners.
Nearly 30,000 independent miners continue to work at the mine, including many children. The deposit will of course eventually run out – in ten years according to the producers – and prices will undoubtedly be increased tenfold.
Source : IPPmedia
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