The International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) has reportedly ordered the Tanzanian government to pay more than $109 million in compensation to a group of companies, fronted by Australian miner Indiana Resources Ltd, for the controversial 2018 expropriation of a nickel mine project.
According to The East African, an ICSID ad hoc tribunal ruled on July 14 that the government violated the UK-Tanzania Bilateral Investment Treaty when it seized the Ntaka Hill Project held by UK-registered Ntaka Nickel Holdings, Nachingwea UK, and Tanzania-registered Nachingwea Nickel.
The total award of $109.5 million includes interest already accrued to the claimants, along with $3.859 million in legal costs to the claimants and ICSID.
Tanzania has 120 days, under ICSID rules, to file an application for annulment of the order.
There are growing concerns in Tanzania that the enforcement of the compensation may include an attempt to seize aircraft operated by the national carrier Air Tanzania, a tactic previously tried by other winners of international arbitration proceedings against Tanzania, and which Indiana Resources had threatened to pursue in the past.
