The fight against galamseyWhose responsibility?

ON AUGUST 19 and 20 this year, the Parliamentary Select Committee on Environment Science and Technology visited Anglo Gold Ashanti, Obuasi mine and Golden Star Bogoso/Prestea Limited respectively.

The mission of the parliamentarians at the two mining companies was simple, to ascertain whether the companies were carrying out their businesses under safe environmental conditions.

“As a committee with the mandate of ensuring that safe environmental practices are carried out in the country, we decided to visit the companies to know what was actually happening '”, the Chairman of the committee, Hon. Kwame Owusu Frimpong stressed in an interview.

As part of their programme, members were to be taken round the various concessions of the respective mines.

THE TOUR

Throughout their visit, from Obuasi to Bogoso, through Prestea, one thing became clear and that is, if care is not taken, we will all wake up one day to hear that, the two mining companies have collapsed as a result of activities of illegal miners who are popularly referred to as galamsey.

At the Alpha Shaft concession of Golden Star Bogoso/Prestea limited at Prestea for instance, one could best described the area as galamsey cottage, looking at how these illegal miners had intelligently designed the area for the purpose of their operations, to the surprise of the parliamentarians.

“So if this is how the illegal miners are taking over your concessions, then how are you going to manage them”, one M.P remarked. Indeed, the rate at which illegal mining is fast growing needs serious governmental attention, as apart from frustrating the operations of the mining companies, these illegal miners as well endanger their lives through unsafe environmental practices.

RESULTS OF GALAMSEY

Reports of deaths related issues are very common in the national dailies and the situation should be of a great worry not only to the affected families but the entire nation.

The situation is even more worrying when women are associated with such deaths as in the case of Madam Tumor, 20.

The Daily Graphic in its Friday 29th August 2008 edition reported how Madam Tumor was trapped to death when she together with three others went on an illegal mining expedition at Jakpa, near Wassa.

The upsurge of illegal mining at Fumbisi and Kadema, in the Builsa district of Upper East region according to a Chronicle report on Tuesday, May 27 led to the death of four people.

The four according to the report died when the cliff of the pit in which they were mining carved.

“In the past five years, six cases of death involving young men in illegal mining have been reported within the concessions of AGA.

Others had also sustained serious injuries that had maimed them for life, and this is causing a lot of concerns to the immediate family members of the victims”, a Daily Graphic report on June 1, 2007 also quoted Mr. Y. B Amponsah, a former General Manager, sustainable development, AGA as saying. THE AIM OF THIS ARTICLE

I have decided to recount all these incidents to portray the dangers associated with illegal mining and why some people might still want to engage in it. Usually, illegal miners say that galamsey operations are one of the ways in which unemployed members of communities affected by mining earn a living. They justified this illegal practice by arguing that lack of employment caused by the loss of farm lands had led them to this job.

Mr. Abu Issaka, 24, who was approached by some members of the parliamentary committee on arrival at one of the sites of the galamseyers at Prestea, explained that if the company had given them job, they would not have been in the galamsey business”.

Under the Ghanaian Minerals Law, minerals found anywhere in the country belong to the state. It does not matter where it is found; the state has the right to grant concession rights to any qualified company that applies for the right over a specific geographical area.

Act 153 section 71 subsection 1 of the Minerals Law says, it is the responsibility of mining companies to compensate occupiers of the concession at the time they are moving in to operate to make sure that all those who have been deprived of their land are paid appropriate and due compensations.

The compensations paid to the affected owners are according to the value of the structure or crops found on such lands, based on the evaluation of the Lands Valuation Board

IMPORTANCE OF MINING COMPANIES

So with the above Acts of the Minerals Law vis a vis concerns raised by Mr. Issaka, I asked the Manager, Human Resources Manager/Administration of Golden Star Bogoso/Prestea Limited Mr. Francis Eduku after the parliamentary committee's visit how much the company had paid by way of compensation since the inception of the company.

Though he could not immediately quantify the total amount paid, he said the amount runs into million of dollars.

He told me that the company is committed to improving its relationship with the communities within its catchment area and disclosed that it had since 1999 spent $ 4, 347, 907 by way of community assistance to such communities.

He cited construction of Bogoso Town Library, Prestea Senior High Technical, Juaben School projects, Mbease Nsuta Day Care Centre, donation of books and training of librarians as some of the assistance the company had offered in the area of education. He also identified sanitation, health, infrastructure as some of the areas the company had extended assistance.

He said Golden Star Oil Palm Plantation (GSOPP) offers sustainable employment opportunities to people living in the mine catchment communities but unfortunately because most of these illegal miners are huge influx from neighbouring countries like Togo, Cote d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Niger, Mali and only interested in the galamsey business, they refuse to take the offer and later blame the company for their unemployment as an excuse for engaging in galamsey.

On what government could do in arresting the situation, he suggested that it should uphold the laws of the land for protection of the environment, people living in these communities, and investors.

This he said was because illegal mining leads to environmental degradation, water pollution, mercury poisoning, erosion to farmlands, and death through cave-ins, noticeable increase in crime, theft, child-labour, and robbery and loss of revenue because government does not benefit from their activities in terms of royalties, community developments and other infrastructural activities.

He called on the Parliamentarians to impress upon the government to bring to extinction all illegal mining activities in all mining areas to enable investors to have confidence in their operations.

Similar assistance were said to have been provided by Anglo Gold Ashanti, Obuasi mine to communities within its jurisdiction.

And now with the provision of all these assistance by the mining companies, the big question now is, why is it that the number of people involved in this illegal mining business keeps soaring up?

It is to help answer the above question that I will call on all stakeholders to assist the five-member committee which was inaugurated on Friday August, 8th this year by the Ministry of mines to address the menance posed by the activities of illegal mining in ensuring that it achieved it aim as we cannot continue to lose lives through illegal mining

Also what we should not loose sight of is the fact that though the country is blessed with resources, those ones are potentials that requires investment to extract for use.

Even though, the writer appreciates the concerns of the galamsey in the area of unemployment, he thinks the country lacks the requisite capital and technology to tap these resources so we should all assist in ensuring that we do not drive away investors.

The Writer is a Chronicle correspondent in Obuasi and could be reached on 0243 855 104 or [email protected]