Land Ministry orders Ghana Manganese Company to stop work

General News of Tuesday, February 5, 2019

Source: citifmonline.com

2019-02-05

The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources has asked the Ghana Manganese Company to stop mining activities before February 15 to allow a financial and technical audit of the company's operations.

The directive is part of initiatives to hold state-owned companies to account.

In a letter signed by the Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Kwaku Asomah Cheremeh, to the company and seen by Citi Business News, the ministry said that a preliminary badessment of the reports, documents and information of the company at the disposal of the government forced it to demand an immediate seizure of the company's activities in its mining sector.

Explaining the situation to Citi Business News, public relations officer of the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources Department, Abraham Otabil said that the company's management had refused to cooperate with the Ministry of Audit, Ministry of Public Works and the Ministry of Finance. where the new directive.

"We have tasked a team to audit the mining companies because too many of them leave this country, be it gold, bauxite or manganese. Last week, we also learned that manganese was leaving this coast of Ghana, which is about 105% compared to 2018, which means that mining companies need to do a lot more in terms of their operations and the level of transparency. . . "

He added, "We wrote that it was early in the year or at the end of last year, even now that the former minister of the sector had to put his books to the disposal of the Land Management Commission, which we have not seen yet. We also received reports from the commission emanating from the department to also enter their books. "

In January, it appeared that "China's imports of manganese ore from Ghana increased in 2017, as China's Tianyuan Manganese expanded its mining capacity in Ghana after acquiring Consolidated Minerals in November 2016".

The report further indicates that "a total of 3.47 million metric tons of manganese ore from Ghana entered China last year, up 106% from 2017, according to customs data ".

It is not clear whether the report triggered the government's position on transparency in the operation of the company, but in July 2018, the then Minister of Industry, Mr. John Peter Amewu, said the government would not renew the mining lease of GMC, because the company "flouted his mining contract".

It appeared that the company had not involved the government in determining the price of manganese ore sold to a company in China for processing there; a situation that could deprive the country of millions of dollars in taxes and fees.