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| Mrs. Hannah Owusu-Koranteng |
One
of Ghana’s leading promoters of good environmental and natural resource governance,
WACAM– has extended its sensitization programme to communities around the
iron-rich Sheini Hills in the Tatale-Sanguli District, with a call on citizens
to know their rights and exercise them appropriately within the confines of the
law.
According to Associate Executive Director of
WACAM, Mrs. Hannah Owusu-Koranteng, when citizens in a potential mining
community such as Sheini understand the benefits and dangers associated with mining,
they are better placed to demand for the right thing to be done by mining
companies and government.
Mrs. Owusu-Koranteng said this when her
organisation in collaboration with the African Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP),
Centre for Public Interest Law (CEPIL) and the Centre for Environmental Impact
Analysis (CEIA) organised a forum at Tatale in the Northern Region of Ghana.
The forum, which was funded by OSIWA, was
to validate baseline studies conducted on the environment, health, livelihood
and socio-economic impacts of iron ore exploration in Sheini.
It was also to create awareness among the citizens
of Sheini, Kandin, Wajado, Nankando and Sangbaa communities, who expressed
interest to learn about their basic rights and entitlements to certain
privileges as enshrined in the country’s Constitution.
The
government of Ghana through Soviet Geologists from Russia discovered large
quantities of iron ore deposits under the Sheini Hills in the late 1960s. Since
that geological test, no other test has been conducted until between 2000 and
2010 a number of mining companies, which expressed interest to mine the resource,
also carried out their independent tests and the results were the same as the
earlier results.
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| Mrs. Owusu-Koranteng Making a Presentation At The Forum |
One of the previous tests conducted indicates
that the Sheini iron ore is one of the finest and largest ever to be discovered
in Africa. The various geological tests indicate that the Sheini iron stones are
about 80.9 per cent rich in iron ore and could be mined continuously for 100
years. Besides iron ore, traces of diamond, manganese, bauxite,
potassium, phosphorous and clinker among others have also been found in the
hills.
In 2010, of about twelve (12) mining companies
that express interest and readiness to develop the concession, Cardero Canada and its Ghanaian partner Emmaland Resources
Limited, were given authorization to conduct exploration on the hills.
But within two years after the two
companies started exploration, the local people began to experience the negative
impact of the exploratory activities as their livelihood sources were being
destroyed in various forms.
For instance, the studies by WACAM cited
the pollution of the Sheini river, destruction of farms and the Sheini bridge,
killing of animals by the vehicles of mining companies among others. The
studies by WACAM further revealed that, 44 percent of respondents claimed the
exploratory activities of the mining companies caused destructions in the
Sheini forest whereas 56 percent of respondents attributed the destruction of
their farmlands to the miners.
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| Polluted Sheini River |
The forum brought together chiefs, Assembly
members, women and youth groups of the various communities. They expressed
gratitude to WACAM and its partners for organising such a forum to educate them
on things they never knew, and called for more of such fora to be organised for
different groups in the communities.
While commending WACAM and its partners for
the sensitisation programme, participants also urged government to enter into
good deals on behalf of Ghana and more importantly, the inhabitants of the
Sheini area.
Citing poor quality education, unmotorable
road networks, ill-equipped schools and health facilities, lack of safe
drinking water as some of their critical needs, they asked Cardero Canada and
its partner or any other investor who may be interested in the iron ore to
consider providing them such facilities.
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