Community Gets Compensated After a Long Struggle

After four years of protracted litigation, Gold field Ghana Limited and four communities around Tarkwa in the Western Region have reached an out-of-court settlement that analysts say can serve as a model for resolving the several mining companies/communities disputes in the country.

The communities old Atuabo, Akontanse and Mandekrom, which were all located within the concession acquired for surface mining by the company are to be moved to New Atuabo.

At the time of the agreement signed on May 28, this year, seven listed cases were pending before court between the company and the communities. Initial moves to evict them from the land was resisted by a section who insisted on better terms, claiming that the conditions at the new location would be difficult to manage.

Some members of the communities, insisting on their fundamental human rights, decided to fight the case collectively in court. They were nicknamed the 'lawyer group'.

The agreement was brokered by an association formed out of the struggles of the communities with the mining companies, the Wassa Association of Communities Affected by Mining (WACAM), base in Tarkwa, in conjunction with the Centre for Public Interest Law (CEPIL) a law set up aimed at defending the deprived in society, an affiliate of Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC) a communities development organisation.

Initially the communities were defended in court by Accra based solicitor, Adu Boahene, now deceased for a nominal fee. Considered as quite satisfactory to all the interested parties, the agreement provided for both monetary compensation and physical replacement for all property lost.

Details of agreement:

To loosen the antagonism built up among the contending parties during the period of litigation, and as a gesture of goodwill, the company has agreed with most of the general demands by WACAM on behave of the communities.

According to the agreement the company will, in addition to the over all package, provide the community based projects.

Significant among these is a clinic, equipped and stuffed with drugs, as well as living quarters for nurses. The facility is to be managed by the Tarkwa Area Health Authorities over a time.

"GFG will renovate these structures and equip and stock the clinic so as to make it ready to be used to provide basic health care service to inhabitants of New Atuabo," the agreement said. It was also agreed that three hand-dug wells with hand pumps will be provided for the community's other water needs, while recognising that there already exist an overhead tank.

The houses to be built at the new site will include all the essential facilities like water and electricity. However the number of rooms each individuals get at the new site will not be same as those lost at the old site. But everybody was satisfied any way for what was agreed on.

Also value for compensation for crops on farmlands, are to be enhanced taking cognisance of the current inflation rate.

Views of signatories:

Commenting on the agreement, the Executive Director of WACAM, Daniel Owusu-Koranteng, said within the legal constraints, the agreement is the best that could be obtained after hard negotiations.

"I am aware that when people are displaced by mining, no amount of money can be satisfactory." Owusu-Koranteng who is also an agricultural economist, environmental and human rights activist said the success of the negotiations to obtain even what they had, shows that it is more beneficial to have an organisation that articulates the views of the vulnerable.

At a point during the litigation, it took efforts of the leaders to impress upon membership the importance of a collective fight, because of the danger of falling for offers presented as adequate.

Owusu-Koranteng said the challenge facing the people living within the mining communities, show the weaknesses of the mining and mineral laws of the country and the need to change them to reflect the needs of the communities. According to the WACAM executive director, the issue of compensation for room should be based on room for room, not on the bases of value for value.

He explained that if in the old place one had wattle and daub of ten room, the same should be build for you at the new place. "In a situation where compensation for room is based on value for value, leads to reduction of rooms, and its attendant social tension and break down of families."

He said there is a strong need for the reform of the mining law to take over PNDC Law 153, which was based on underground mining not surface mining. Otherwise it would be difficult to deal with the problems facing communities within the mining areas. "I want to comment that even though we had enhance compensation, the impact of mining on the community is so great which lead to the suffering of the people."

The WACAM executive said the next focus of the organisation is the alternative source of employment and how to utilize the compensation money received. "It is a major issue...we plan to organise entrepreneur awareness training for the settlement, it is our challenge." Machinery of judgment is slow process-Cepil Views

Giving the background to the agreement, the Executive Director of CEPIL, Dominic Ayine said it was the failure of the committee set-up by the Western Regional Co-ordinating Council to resolve all matters in the dispute between Goldfields and the affected communities that led to the problems.

According to Ayine the communities were dissatisfied generally with recommendations of the Committee known as the Hommyiah, on the grounds that it did not meet the constitutional standard of fair and adequate compensation. "It is the break down of mechanism that left to the litigation" he said.

Initially while some accepted the recommendations of the Hommyiah Committee others were not and decided to challenge it.

However because the mechanism of judgment grind slowly in this country, it took close to four years before the parties decide those negotiations by and between them was the best way out.

In the course of litigation, both sides raised issues, some of which went to the Supreme Court.

But the court could not take a decision because at a point the counsel for Goldfields withdrew the appeal to the Supreme Court.

"The agreed settlement reached between the affected communities and Goldfields, though far from being ideal, represents a significant step forward in the relation between mining company operating in the country," Ayine said.

He said it also represent an important admission by Goldfields that it has certain social and corporate responsibility towards the communities in which it carries out its mining activities.

"It is the view of CEPIL that by incorporating certain social amenities into the negotiated settlement, has ensure the fulfillment of Goldfields' corporate responsibility," the CEPIL executive director said.