Empowering Locals…
SIERRA LEONE URGED TO EMULATE GHANA
While the Government of Sierra Leone seems to be thwarting an indigenous company from securing and operating the Kasafoni Iron ore deposit in Tonkolili North, in Ghana, Ibrahim Mahama – a son of the soil and business magnate – has acquired the Black Volta Gold Project with a hundred million dollar ($100,000) investment to develop what will become that country’s first large-scale, and entirely Ghanaian-owned gold mining operation in the Upper West Region of the country.
Through his Engineers & Partners (E&P), Mahama will now reclaim control of Ghana’s gold resources from the clutches and hegemony of multinationals – a major shift in the country’s extractive industry.
Renowned industrialists have described the move as necessary, merit-based and commercially sound investment, further hailing the initiative as a milestone in enhancing local job creation, community development, while contributing significantly to Ghana’s export earnings and national economic growth.
Ghana’s bold and legitimate business decision is exemplary – grounded in a transaction without any interference, no backroom dealing, but by a transparent, credible and legal process. The move also underscores the importance of indigenous ownership and control of a nation’s strategic and economically viable industry from the historical grips of foreign interests.
In Sierra Leone, however, despite escalating criticisms and condemnations by landowners, inhabitants and paramount chiefs, including well-meaning Sierra Leoneans across the board, the authorities seem to be celebrating a foreign firm, twisting the laws and pushing for it to secure the Kasafoni Concession, and mine its rich iron ore deposit in parts of Tonkolili and Koinadugu districts in the northern region, much at the expense of an 100% fully Sierra Leonean-owned company in particular, and landowners and community stakeholders, by extension.
For the umpteenth time, calls have been made upon the Sierra Leonean authorities to set the pace for indigenous businesses to reclaim the country’s country’s mining industry and other sectors from the historic grip of multinationals but to no avail.
Local control of a country’s strategic and economically viable sectors significantly increases job creation, local manufacturing, and national economic growth. Multinational companies destroy our environment, extract the minerals, and leave us in abject poverty and squalor.
The government policy that was initiated to prioritize local industrial leadership and labour, production of goods and services, remains mere papers, and a carcass as the foreign monopoly continues unabated in the extractive industry.
Foreign corporations treat local employees and state authorities with brazen pettiness without recourse to the labour laws and other national legislations – treatment indigenes would not dare mete against their counterparts – yet foreign interest are touted, promoted and celebrated by state authorities even as they rape our country’s resources with impunity.
Practically and legally, it is not judicious for the government or any of its agency, or representative to claim land ownership in the provinces without the consent of landowning families and the knowledge/involvement of paramount chiefs. In the provinces, land is governed by customary tenure, and ownership is vested in families or communities, not the state.
Here, Paramount chiefs act as custodians, not owners, and decisions must involve both the families and the chiefs. Remember the conflict risk – imposing authority over customary land without due process has led to distrust and conflict, community resistance, and even violence in the past.
Moreover, the Customary Land Rights Act (2022) reinforces the need for free, prior, and informed consent from landowners before any transaction or use of their property, even by the state. So, for peace, legality, and good governance, consent and consultation are absolutely necessary.
Like what is happening in Ghana, Sierra Leonean authorities should borrow a leaf from that country to unfold a paradigm shift of the mining sector from multinational to local interest. In this case, the Gento Group of Companies must be allowed to take over the Kasafoni Concession as already been sanctioned by the landowners, inhabitants and their paramount chiefs with in the confines of the Customary and national legislations of Sierra Leone. The landowners have spoken, the paramount chiefs have decided – It is the law; don’t override it – it’s their bloodstained asset and inheritance – it’s their right!