Africans Learn to Play the Game

Whether a child is playing Candy Land or trading Pokemon cards, an innocent young child can be tricked into trading a valuable card for one less useful. But as they learn how to play the game this kind of trickery no longer works. Africa has a lot of valuable "cards," and Africa will learn, and is learning, not to be fooled by those who take advantage of corruption, questionable land titles, promises of employment, and pretend friendships.

     Since Africa has valuable mineral deposits, the continent has been a target of questionable mining deals. After the Democratic Republic of the Congo seized First Quantum Minerals, the close relationship of an Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) partner with Congo President Joseph Kabila caused First Quantum to question the financial deal that enabled ENRC to purchase its seized copper assets. The legal dispute did not end after Luxembourg-based Eurasian Resources Group (ERG) acquired ENRC and strengthened its position in Africa's copper belt. In fact, ERG's stake in the former ENRC became even more valuable after the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) and China's Export-Import Bank provided $700 million to build the copper and cobalt project that made ERG the world's largest producer of the cobalt used in batteries. The UK's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) continues to investigate ENRC's original deal with the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

     In Hia, Ghana, Bishop Afoakwah walked through mounds of dirt and deep puddles to do his own investigation of a gold mine digging a massive pit on church land. Earlier, after one of the mine's earthmoving machines cut an electrical line that left the town without power, Bishop Afoakwah had met with local chiefs. He understood the church held a legal deed to the land that had been donated by a chief for the purpose of building a clinic and nursing school. During his meeting, the bishop learned various chiefs claimed to protect land for other chiefs and, taking advantage of the interwovern land rights and the high per ounce price of gold, a Chinese mine owner provided a payoff to secure a mining concession on the church's land. At the gold mine, workers said a "Mr. Kumar" owned the Hia site. Two Chinese engineers dashed into the bush, when they saw the bishop approaching. Ghana's Minerals Commission only has eight officials to investigate the country's illegal mining and an incomplete database of mining concessions. President Nana Akufo-Addo, who took office in January, 2017, put Ghana's Chinese miners on notice that he intends to enforce laws governing gold mining.

     Not only have gold mining operations destroyed agricultural land that has fed local farmers for generations, but heavy machinery has buried and severely injured untrained workers and health-damaging cyanide and mercury used to extract gold from stone have contaminated air and water. Farmers who sell their land to miners enjoy only a short-term gain that lasts a few years. Even if the land is returned to them after the mine is exhausted, the three feet of top soil are destroyed and the poor quality clay soil underneath cannot support a family. Yet, workers who fear losing salaries from mining jobs willingly risk their health and ignore environmental consequences. In fact, miners have thrown rocks at inspectors and even killed a fleeing official by rolling over him with a car.

     The path to legal mining in Ghana and in other developing countries is a difficult one. It requires learning "to play the game" without corruption and payoffs, with only those foreign investors willing to train employees and commit to some community development, and with activists like Bishop Afoakwah who are willing to take on lengthy court battles for damages done to the land by illegal miners. In the end, Africans will come to the same conclusion that Cardinal Peter Turkson, archbishop emeritus of Cape Coast, Ghana, did. "It is...unjustifiable for developing countries to fuel the development of richer countries at the cost of their own present and future."

     While Ghana continues to sort out land ownership issues affecting local gold miners, a group of 33 illegal gold miners in Uganda spent four years forming the first gold mine the UK's Fairtrade organization certified in Africa. The Syanyonja Artisan Miners Alliance (SAMA) now boasts: 1) a timbered pit unlike the dangerous open pits where dirt walls collapse, when heavy downpours swamp quarries and whole families of miners, and 2) gold extraction processes that employ proper handling of mercury and cyanide. SAMA's certified gold mine offers small-scale coop members the prospect of premium prices, savings, a local health center, and subsidized school fees. Now that the association pays taxes SAMA members find they have more government influence. SAMA also benefits from the "I Do" campaign sponsored by the Fairtrade Foundation's focus on commodities campaign in the UK, which alerts couples to choose Fairtrade Gold wedding bands.

Earlier posts involving Africa's resources include:

• Wood: Don't Take Any Wooden Nickels, Uncover the Economic Value of Wood
• Coffee: Invest in Africa's Agricultural Future; Coffee Prices Going Up; Allowances Going Down?
• Cocoa: Become A Discriminating Chocolate Consumer, Chocolate Tasting Party and More; Chocolate's Sweet Deals
• Palm oil: Can Small Farms End Poverty?
• Oil: Nigeria's New Beginning
• Diamonds: Diamond Flaws

Also see the earlier post: Why Will Africa Overcome Poverty?"