Accra, Ghana, November 30, 2018//-The Deputy Chairman of the Select Committee on Mines and Energy, Adam Mutawikilu, has disclosed that as of May 2018, 23 mining companies are mining in Ghana without parliamentary approval.
According to him, this development is worrying and called on the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources to bring these mining companies’ licenses to Parliament for approval.
He didn’t disclose the names and operational areas of the 23 mining companies operating with the lawmakers’ approval.
Mr Mutawikilu who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Damongo constituency in the Northern Region disclosed this at the launch of book titled-‘License to Drill: A Manual on Integrity in Extractive Sector Licensing’ in Accra.
He stress: “We must be interested in all the processes of mining and drilling in the country. This is because if we get them wrong, we will lose all the revenue from our natural resources to the mining and drilling companies”.
The World Bank Country Director for Ghana, Henry Kerali, added that without strong management and oversight in the use of natural resources could undermine development and some cases had led to wars.
“For the natural resources and extractives sectors, corruption in management and governance is particularly challenging, and difficult to mitigate”, he said.
“Assessing the many deals and transactions is often even more difficult and complicated, particularly in countries with weak regulatory governance, where transparency and integrity safeguards are lacking”, Mr Kerali said.
The Chief Executive Officer of Minerals Commission, Kwaku Addae Antwi-Boasiako noted: “Licensing and permitting have become an important part of government revenue generation process”.
To ensure transparency within this process, he indicated that the commission is implementing a number of programmes.
Top on the list, according to him, is the implementation of a modern Mineral Rights Administration System that is based on geographic information system (GIS), a system designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present spatial or geographic data.
On his part, Emmanuel Kuyole, CEO of the Centre for Extractive and Development Africa, a leading extractives sector NGO, believes that; “we can get more from our resources, than we are getting now if we insist on strict licensing and permitting regime”.
Just in 2017 alone, the country’s mining sector contributed $2.1 billion representing 16% up to government revenue. Cumulatively, the mining and oil & gas sectors contributed about 65% of total merchandize exports in 2017.
By Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, African Eye Report
Email: mk68008@gmail.com
