We the undersigned organisations are writing to strongly urge you, for reasons elaborated in subsequent paragraphs, to reconsider the Memorandum of Understanding that ECOWAS signed with Oxfam America for the preparation of a mining code for the ECOWAS region. We are united in our belief in the importance of strong organisation and expression of citizens in relation to policies affecting their interests. We are also united in our opposition to any form of policy capture by international organisations which compromise local ownership. In this regard we see policy advocacy as an important facet of building a strong citizenship culture in the context of an all round deepening of democracy.  We are of the view that the implications of the ECOWAS-Oxfam America relationship undermine rather than advance these principles.

The first public notice we had of this relationship was provided by an Oxfam America press release of April 14 2008 titled ‘Oxfam America and ECOWAS to create new mining code’. According to the press release, ‘Oxfam America and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) agreed on April 4, 2008 to collaborate on creating a common mining code for all of West Africa’. It also said that ‘Oxfam America will oversee the participation of civil society representatives in the drafting of the new mining code’.

Considering the importance of the extractive sector in the economies of a significant number of West African countries we believe that a regional approach to elements of extractive sector policy would be beneficial for ECOWAS member countries. There are many issues on which a regional approach could help improve standards and developmental benefits from non-renewal natural resources. We therefore welcome the extension of ECOWAS’ concerns to mining and the establishment of a Department of Industry and Mines in the ECOWAS Commission.

Our concerns about the agreement with Oxfam America are based on three main elements:

a)      The role that the agreement ascribes to Oxfam America in ECOWAS-West African CSOs relations undermines the building of a strong citizenship culture and its expression in relations between ECOWAS and citizens and their organisations in the region. The role is colonial and patronizing and it violates the Southern Campaigning and Advocacy principles that the global Oxfam family adopted some years ago.

b)     Oxfam America’s overall role in the project strongly manifests some of the very forms of donor capture of policy making that African governments supported by their citizens as well as many solidarity voice and actors from the global North have been campaigning against.

c)      Considering that ECOWAS’ foray into mining policy is relatively new the design and time table of the project places ECOWAS at the risk of missing out on a historic opportunity to contribute and benefit from the continental review of the experience of mining codes across Africa which has been initiated by the ECA and AU. 

a.   No to Oxfam America’s vast superintendent powers over ECOWAS CSOs

According to the Oxfam America-ECOWAS MoU ‘The overall Goal of this project is “To facilitate WA civil society contribution to the formulation of a harmonized regional mining policy that is pro-poor, respectful of environment and human rights, and that keeps governments and mining companies accountable through improved governance practice”. All over the African continent the practice of African governments and inter-governmental bodies in respect of involving citizens and CSOs in policy leaves much to be desired. Sadly how the ECOWAS-Oxfam Agreement seeks to deal with the problem raises its own set of profound problems.

The MoU effectively installs Oxfam America as kind of godfather/shepherd of CSOs for the purposes of drawing up an ECOWAS mining code. Even the most casual reading of the role the MoU assigns them shows that they are installed as gate keepers and determinants of who among West African CSOs get to participate in the exercise. It is through Oxfam America partners and affiliates that the rest of ECOWAS get connected to the project and ‘ownership by West African CSOs’ is ensured. When it comes to a regional seminar for CSOs and CBOs it is Oxfam that will be responsible for gathering these actors, identify and decide the venue for the gathering. It is Oxfam America that is responsible for gathering CBOs and CSOs.  In addition to undermining local ownership the terms on which this superintendent role will be exercised are not transparent.

An important component of the past two or so decades of democratic expansion and consolidation across West Africa has been the considerable growth in the knowledge and capacity of local CSOs and CBOs and their collective organisation around a variety of issues. ECOWAS itself has recognised this as expressed in relations with the CSOs gathered in WASCOF.  Mining is one such area where civil society organisations have emerged at community and national levels, with growing regional cooperation among groups. In Ghana National Coalition on Mining, which brings together community based groups from mining areas and NGOs is recognised by all the relevant policy makers as key actor for mining policy dialogue. In Ghana as in other places these efforts have been supported, in the spirit of solidarity by Northern NGOs as opposed to being superintended by them. 

We are keen to understand from the ECOWAS Commission the basis on which Oxfam America came to be installed as the mediator/ organizer of the engagement of ECOWAS CSOs with the code drafting process.  It is however clear that by installing Oxfam America as the conductor of its relations with mining CSOs and CBOs ECOWAS has thrown away an important opportunity for contributing to the deepening of its democratic engagement with West African civil society organisations in an important policy area. 

ECOWAS and the wider African context

The ECOWAS-Oxfam America MoU correctly highlights how the current global boom in the  price of minerals and metals have underlined what West African and other African countries  have not earned from the export of their minerals, even as mining affected communities and the environment have paid a huge price for the exploitation of these resources by TNCs. This recognition has generated a continent wide movement calling for the revision of not only existing contracts but a radical re-think of how African countries conceive of the place of minerals in their national development strategies and therefore what their mining codes should embody. This call has been taken up from the level of continental bodies such as the UN-ECA, AU and AfDB as well as in the engagements of community and national level CBOs and NGOs across the continent.

We believe that this rare unanimity provides a unique chance for African governments, regional bodies and institutions, working with citizens to seek some convergence as well as coherence on key principles in relation to mining sector policy even as we remain pragmatic about which policy making levels offer the best site for creating enforceable norms for different clusters of issues in mining. In this regard we think the conception and pace of ECOWAS’ regional efforts should pay attention to the continental level processes centred around the International Study Group (ISG) convened by the UN-ECA to make real the implications of the conclusions of the February 2007 Big Table policy discussions of the AU, ECA and AfDB.   The work of the ISG link to the AU will be taken a step forward at a meeting of African Ministers of Mining/Natural Resources scheduled at the AU in September. At their meeting in March 2008 Africa’s Finance Ministers commended the work of the ISG and declared their support for it.

ECOWAS’ foray into mining policy is relatively new and its institutional set up and processes for this area of policy are still evolving. We believe that the interests of the ECOWAS region will be very well served by an active involvement in the ECA’s reform initiative, considering the range of expertise and experience that it brings together. Two regions with more advanced regional mining harmonisation efforts, UEMOA and SADC, are active participants in the work of the ECA’s ISG. There is no incompatibility between a radically rethought ECOWAS regional process and ECOWAS being part of a continental process. Such an engagement will be consistent with the oft expressed concerns of regional and continental leaders for greater coherence in major policy areas among the RECs. It will allow ECOWAS officials to share what is going on in ECOWAS, learn what thinking is going on in other regions and how together the regions influence the continental perspective on this important area of policy and development.

In our view this approach will be much more productive than the unfolding course of action which we see as a rush into what could very well turn out to be an ultimately frustrating exercise at drawing up a regional mining code, based on the flawed relationship with Oxfam America.  Experience from everywhere shows that the process of creating supra-national legal instruments, especially where national norms and derivative contractual relations already exist as is the case with mining in West Africa, are invariably long drawn and arduous. In our view, in addition to the reservations already expressed about the current code drafting exercise the timeline for its completion is very optimistic.

Conclusion

Mr. President, these are the reasons for our urging you to seriously reconsider the agreement with Oxfam America. The business of drawing up a thoughtfully prepared ECOWAS mining code, the wider processes taking place on the continent in relation to the future of mining which we strongly believe ECOWAS should part of, as well as using the code drafting process to build a constituency in support of a new policy direction in mining across ECOWAS are all compromised by the terms of the relationship established by the ECOWAS-Oxfam America MoU.

Follow the articles here: http://www.twnafrica.org/index.php?option=com_user&view=login&Itemid=108

TWN-Africa's Gyekye Tanoh addresses participants during the Panel of four country representatives, which include Roger Moody, UK; Makanatsa M, Zimbabwe; Noah Zimba. Seated are (from right to left) Roger Moody; Makanatsa; Yao Graham and Lindyln Tamufor of TWN-Africa.

The purpose of this press release is to condemn the propaganda of the Chamber of Mines and to demand of it and its membership to end violence and human rights abuses perpetuated against people living in communities affected by mining.

This release is made at the monthly rotation meeting of the National Coalition on Mining held Tuesday June 3^rd, 2008 in the conference room of Third World Network-Africa.

In the last few weeks, in commemorating its 80^th anniversary, the Chamber of Mines has sought to project the mining industry as an industry going beyond the call of duty in its contribution to community livelihood, the environment and the national economy as a whole. The Chamber exaggerated this stance by formulating the theme for the eightieth anniversary dubbed “Life is impossible without mining”.

We view this theme not only as intellectually dishonest and mischievous, calculated to sweep the negative environmental, human rights, social and economic legacies under the carpet but also a feeble attempt, as usual, to manipulate the psyche of citizens into believing the Chamber’s construction of what constitute mining. In fact, what is particularly dishonest about the theme is the attempt by the Chamber to wrap all types of mining and interests into the industry’s particular conception of mining which has been inherently destructive and hostile to other interest. Artisanal small scale mining including also the winning of sand, clay and other minerals has long been consistent with traditional forms of community social and economic organisation. Today, corporate commercial mining advocated by the Chamber angles many other competing interests around mining. For instance, thousands of small scale miners are displaced by the Chamber’s construction of mining. Several of these small scale miners constitute the population who lost their farmlands to corporate commercial mining.

Again, even as mining is potentially important, the reality is that there are thousands of people out there whose daily livelihood choices have nothing to do with mining the type of mining conceived by the industry. At the national level, despite the long history of mining the Ghanaian state has benefited only marginally from mining. Today, it is no longer the lone voice of local communities and NGOs who argue that mining has not contributed enough to government revenue and national development but also multilateral institutions such as the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), and indeed the architects of the current framework for mining i.e. the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Yet the environmental, human rights and social problems are in the increase as the industry searches for more grounds for mining, as they introduce new technologies and methods of mining, and as they collude with the state to lower national standards for mining. Therefore, this attempt to turn facts on their heads will not wash.

In its eighty years of existence, the Ghana Chamber of Mines directly and indirectly and through its strong lobby of the state continues to supervise:

·        Massive destruction of the environment by mining companies

·        Excessive deprivation of the national economy and citizens from accessing the full benefits of mineral resources  

·        Indiscriminate dislocation and displacement of local communities from their land, water resources and cultural heritage

·        Increased violence and human rights abuses of people living in communities affected by mining as well as small-scale miners.

We could have left the propaganda of the Chamber to the public to judge. However due to the Chamber’s trajectory of massive propaganda in the last eighty years, we are compelled to offer an appropriate response. Because, our silence could be interpreted to mean that the Chamber is offering the truth.

As we celebrate the World Environment Day which falls on June 5^th each year, we condemn the industry propaganda and demand of it to end:

·        The destruction of the environment

·        Deprivation of communities from ownership and access to their livelihoods

·        The violence and human rights abuses perpetuated against people living in communities affected by mining.

·        All such propaganda that is destructive to the productive capacity of the national economy.

The National Coalition on Mining (NCOM) is a grouping of communities, NGOs, and individuals engaged in mining sector advocacy for environmental sustainability, human and community rights, and national economic development.

Third World Network-Africa is the secretariat of NCOM. For further information on this, please contact Abdulai Darimani or Lindlyn Tamufour at 021-503669/500419 Email: environment@twnafrica.org or adarimani@yahoo.co.uk

List of members participating in the meeting

Abdulai Darimani, Third World Network-Africa

Noble Wadzah, Friends of the Earth Ghana

John Adza The African Challenge

Richard Adjei-Poku, Livelihood & Environment Ghana, Kenyasi

Eric Amoako-AAta, Chirano Community

Lindlyn A. Tamufor, Third World Network-Africa

M. Y. Bingle, Economic Justice Network

David Pessey, Civic Response

Anna Antwi, Action Aid Ghana

Clement Kofi Scot, Obuasi Community

Benjamin Annan, Sanso Community/Electoral Area

Mike Anane, Foodfirst Information and Action Network, Ghana

Edward K. Akuolo, Community Rights Foundation, Obuasi

Title: The Glittering Facade

Effects of Mining Activities on Obuasi and Its Surrounding

Communities

Authors: Akabzaa T. M.; Seyire J. S. and Afriyie K.

Pages: 124

Published by: Third World Network Africa (TWN Africa)

Reviewed by: Caroline Boateng

THE Glittering Facade, from the onset draws the reader into a critical consideration of the real economic and social benefits of mining in the country.

The title is suggestive of the farce of the assumed contribution of mining to national development, and can also pass as an apt clarion call on all to consider actions collectively and individually that degrade the country’s environment.

The book, borne out of years of detailed studies commissioned by Third World Network Africa (TWN Africa) on the environmental impact of gold mining in Obuasi in the Adansi West District of the Ashanti Region, is replete with issues that indict individual, corporate and governmental actions and inaction that destroy the very environment that sustains lives. Obuasi lies wholly within the concession of the Ashanti Goldfields Limited (now AngloGold Ashanti), and for more than 100 years, mining has been dominant.

The Glittering Facade is a follow up to a previous publication, “Boom and Dislocation”, that significantly contributed to changing public perception on the impact of the country’s gold mining industry on the people living in communities affected by mining.

The book goes a step further in scientifically analysing the environment, disease prevalence in some mining areas, as well as the socio-economic impact of mining on the lives of people living in Obuasi.

Akabzaa T. M., Seyire J. S. And Afriyie K., the authors, in assessing the level of environmental pollution and possible health implications, sampled water, fruits and sediments.

The scientific study was then integrated with socio-economic and health surveillance surveys to assess the impact of mining on the communities.

Research methods used in the study were interdisciplinary, including both scientific analyses and social science research methods and covered the period from 2003 to 2005, although research analyses of some data covered 1989 to 2003.

The book is authoritative, in that it thoroughly covers all perspectives in the mining sector, as respondents of the surveys, focus group discussions and interviews were drawn from a wide cross-section of governmental, non- governmental, civil society organisations (CSOs) and other key partners in mining.

The authors note the refusal of a major key partner, Ashanti Goldfields Limited, to participate in the research. The book juxtaposes arguments for and against mining activities in the country for readers to decide on appropriate actions.

Arguments in support of the activity include the sector’s contribution to merchandise export, gross national foreign exchange earnings, gross domestic product (GDP), employment and government revenue.

Counter arguments point to the levels of mineral exports retained in off-shore accounts, the enclave nature of the industry and the generous capital allowances in the country’s Minerals and Mining Law that account in part for the minimal impact of the sector on the national economy.

Also the distinct disjoint of the sector to the rest of the economy, shown by a GDP contribution of 2 to 5 per cent since independence is another of the counter arguments.

Provocatively, an underlying thought that nags readers is whether the immediate economic and financial gains of the sector, the result of policies that gives greater incentives to investors, make up for the long term and sometimes irreversible depletion of the environment, livelihoods and human life.

The tacit condoning of international financing agencies with money and clout, government, corporate executives and individuals, can be inferred on reading the chapter on the history of Ashanti Goldfields Limited.

The authors in their quest to assess the impact of mining come out with results that show abnormally high concentrations of heavy metals in areas studied. Water samples were acidic and fell outside Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and World Health Organisation (WHO) standards for drinking water.

Arsenic and manganese concentrations were also observed with the concentration of manganese in some villages exceeding the permitted EPA guidelines.

Analyses of health surveillance data at the Obuasi Government Hospital of sixteen communities, integrated with water, sediment and fruit surveys and community perceptions of the causes of common ailments showed that malaria, diarrhoea, skin diseases, acute respiratory infections (ARI) and acute eye infections were the most prevalent diseases annually.

These also had unmistakable linkages with the types of mining activities being undertaken near the surveyed towns, with peak records of these diseases at the peak period of mining activity.

The authors point out that “most diseases recorded annual peak values from 1997 to 2001 when surface mining was at its peak”. The authors take each community by turn and assess the type of mining activity and type of disease prevalence.

For instance, Kwabrafoso, which is at the heart of a number of processing facilities and waste dumps, saw increased out – patient department (OPD) reported cases of malaria, diarrhoea ARI and skin disease, between 1994 and 2002.

Sansu, with a concentration of surface mine pits, ore crushing and mining facilities and Sulphide Treatment Plants (STP) with considerable dust and stream pollution, also saw the incidence of diseases, such as ARI, diarrhoea, skin disease and eye infection in addition to malaria from 1994 to 2002, peaking between 1998 and 2002.

The Glittering Facade critically looks at the methods of mining and describes surface mining as “a new generation of mines which have been operational only in the last fifteen years” but which has “generated far more waste and consumed far more land space than the over one hundred years of underground mining.”

The legacies of this form of mining have included huge abandoned craters or open pits, filled with pools of water, tailing damps and cyanide containment lakes that are hazardous to people in the communities.The high environmental and social costs of land and vegetation destruction, loss of lands, livelihoods, health and displacements and resultant conflict that come up are thoroughly discussed.

The book is easy -to- read, even though it is a publication from scientific research findings. The book convinces that the economic and financial gains made in the mining sector as a result of policies that give great incentives to investors, cannot make up for the depletion of the environment, livelihoods and human life.

With scientific analyses being undertaken with sterling governmental agencies like the Water Research Institute of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and health surveillance data from the Obuasi Government Hospital in the socio-economic survey, The Glittering Facade cannot be taken for granted.

Akabzaa T. M., Seyire J. S. and Afriyie K., conclude that in the long run, in comparative terms, mining does not significantly impact positively on host communities. The attendant social and economic cost become fatal on host communities particularly when policies, fashioned with the clout of international finance and influence, does not in a complementary manner ensure the interest of the host communities.

“With regard to infrastructural facilities and development, the mining towns of Obuasi, Tarkwa, Prestea, Konongo, among others, provide a classic picture of the typical mining towns in Ghana. These towns are far from affluent, an aberration of what communities endowed with mineral resources, are or should look like. The towns are very much unlike other gold mining towns such as Johannesburg in South Africa, Noranda City in Ontario, Canada, Reno in the USA or Perth in Australia, where the scars of mining are sealed by the beauty and riches of these cities, built out of mining”, is a provoking quote from the book that buttresses this point.

The authors recommend, among other things, the concerted effort of AGC, district assemblies and other partners in addressing challenges of environmental degradation and the re-examination of policies to a balance of the interest of host communities and mining companies.

The book makes for compelling reading, particularly for proponents of the indisputable benefits of mining to the national economy, as it could help them either confirm their notions by discounting the evidence in the book or help them to critically review actions and policies for a balance of interest in the sector that will make mining, a glittering, livelihood enhancing and socio-economically viable venture for all partners.

It is an invaluable policy document for governments, a sort of mining charter for all partners and a wealth of information. It is available at the Legon Bookshop and all leading bookshops in the country.

UNCTAD XII PANEL DISCUSSION ON

'WHY THE EPAs ARE AGAINST DEVELOPMENT'

Organized by the Africa Trade Network (ATN) in collaboration with Stop EPA Advocacy & Campaign Partners

Date and Venue:  09.30am-12.30pm, Tuesday 22nd April 2008 at the 'NGO Hall', Ghana International Conference Centre, Accra.

Background: In December 2007 35 ACP countries, including 19 African countries, initialed so-called 'Interim Economic Partnership Agreements' (IEPAs) with the European Commission, as a stepping stone towards comprehensive EPAs to be completed in 2008. The Caribbean Region has already concluded such a full EPA with the EU. As is widely acknowledged, the EPAs will radically affect ACP-EU trade and economic relations and have profound negative impacts on ACP national and regional economies. Further, as a potential model for North-South relations, the EPAs have implications far beyond the regions and peoples directly concerned. Africa will experience the most concentrated and far-reaching impacts of the EPAs, and therefore has perhaps the strongest imperative for interrogating and resisting the EPAs.

UNCTAD XII, taking place in Africa, offers the opportunity: i) To consolidate the voices of concern and dissent - official-cum-civil society- around the 'actually- existing EPAs' as an effective pole of influence and to harmonize their interactions, mutual support and collaboration in intervening in EPA processes; ii) To root this consolidation in a practical frame of reference of strategic imperatives, parameters and 'red lines' in the EPAs and, iii). To mainstream critiques against EPAs in richer and more comprehensive linkages with progressive initiatives of, and within, developing countries in the wider milieu of Development and Trade.

Moderator:  Gyekye Tanoh, Third World Network Africa/ ATN

Speakers:

Cheikh Tidiane Dieye, ENDA Tiers Monde, Senegal/ATN

Emily Jones, Oxfam GB

Hon Deputy Minister of Trade & Industry, Republic of South Africa

Representative of the Ministry of Economics, Brazil

Hon Minister for Commerce, Republic of Senegal (tbc)

Contact: ATN Secretariat, email: politicaleconomy@twnafrica.org ; Christabel Phiri: +233 246 935127

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