We know Ghana is endowed with considerable amount of a variety of mineral resources. The extraction of these resources should improve the living conditions of local communities and advance national economic development through employment generation, increased government revenue, foreign exchange earnings, and technology transfer.

However, the current contribution of the mining sector to national economic and local community development is at best questionable and at worst negative. Recent policy reforms have liberalised the mining sector in line with IMF/World Bank prescriptions and attracted increased investment from transnational mining companies. Correlatively, the increase in foreign investment has not been translated into increased employment, government revenue, and contribution to gross domestic product. At the same time, this expansion of their operations has entailed:
 Environmental degradation
 Destruction of community sources of livelihood with very inadequate compensation schemes and packages
 Taking over of land and causing severe food insecurity, particularly in resettlement communities.
 Displacement of people and their families
 Social conflicts and human rights violations

Indeed, mining tends to worsen social marginalisation within affected local communities. Vulnerable groups such as women, the elderly, the disabled and children suffer disproportionately from mining related dislocations. Women have been victims of direct displacement from their productive activities by mining operations. They have also suffered gender discrimination and inequality from the little benefits accruing from compensation entitlement. For example the manner in which mining companies and the state distribute “compensation” for destruction of homesteads and economic activity consistently results in male “family heads” expropriating women who are typically equal holders of agricultural and domestic assets.

In addition, we note the declining access to fresh and clean water and fertile land as well as the deteriorating health status of communities affected by mining. These critical livelihood problems are a direct product of severe environmental degradation caused by mining operations. Communities affected by mining confront a world in which subsistence farming has collapsed and they must now pay cash for all their needs. At the same time the state and mining companies fail to offer them educational and training opportunities. They are therefore effectively excluded from jobs in the new mining economy. The state also fails to ensure that they receive adequate compensation for the loss of their natural assets to mining companies. Cut off from access to jobs, schools, clinics, roads, water and electricity these communities are rapidly decaying. This is indeed genocide of a kind.

In addition to this gradual genocide, communities affected by mining have for many years recorded and reported affronts to their human dignity and violations of their rights that contravene principles set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, especially social and economic rights as contained in Article 25. They also violate the rights acknowledged by the 1992 Constitution of Ghana. In our 2006 complaint to the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice which we have circulated to the Minister of Defence, the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Justice we have specifically listed instances of savage abuse of citizens’ rights by mining companies, the police and the military. They include:
 Violent, illegal arrest and detention of community members;
 Torture of persons illegally arrested and detained;
 Assault and battery (sometimes involving firearms and other deadly weapons) of youth accused of involvement in illegal mining or either trespass on mine property;
 Interference (often violent and again involving firearms) with citizens’ constitutional right to publicly protest against activities of mining companies that affect them negatively.
 Operation of private prisons by mining companies;
 Harassment of critics of mining company practices;

Since we formally drew public attention to the situation more than a year ago, so far neither state regulatory and security agencies nor mining companies involved in these matters have taken responsibility for the consequences of their actions.

We are concerned that these acts of impunity on human beings, the environment, and national economy are set to continue as government continues to lower standards for mining companies. The policies of indiscriminate investment liberalisation which have contributed to these developments are now set to be entrenched in international trade agreements, such as the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) being negotiated between West African States and the European Commission.

As we celebrate World Environment Day under the global theme “Climate Change” some mining companies are extending their operations into already depleted forest reserves. The destruction of forest cover further exposes humanity’s vulnerability to climate change. The reduction in forest cover through activities such as surface mining increases the amount of carbon release into the atmosphere and our vulnerability to climate change. In fact, the current energy crisis in the country has a direct link in part to the reckless depletion of the environment, in particular tree population and forest cover.

On the basis of the foregoing we make the following demands:

 1. Mining companies should live up to their obligation and responsibility to protect the environment for intra and inter-generational equity.

 2. State regulatory agencies should exercise their responsibility imposed on them by the sovereign citizens of Ghana by promoting and ensuring the maximum realisation of the benefits of mining including the protection of the environment and upholding the dignity and respect of all persons particularly communities affected by mining.

 3. Given the experience of oil extraction in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria, we wish to call on Government to receive the reported discovery of oil in the Western region of Ghana with cautious optimism. The reported discovery of oil should be a wake-up call to put in place the relevant petroleum policy framework that would maximise the net benefits of oil to the State and guarantee human and community rights and environmental sustainability.

 4. Government must address the question of forest governance in order to minimise and at best end the decimation of forest resources by a handful of mining and timber companies,

 5. Also, government must take action to end the official subservience to the whims of big business, while offering a guarantee for forest-owning communities’ fair access to their resources for livelihood and a fair share of the proceeds from timber sales.

 6. We call on the government to reject the inclusion of terms and conditions in international investment and services agreements, especially the EPA which will contribute to escalating the destruction of livelihoods for farmers, fisher folks, workers, and small service providers.

 7. In keeping with the reputation of Ghana as a free and peaceful country, Government, led by the Office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, must recognise the critical implications of the abuse of human rights and lives of families and individuals affected by mining and immediately intervene in order to bring rapid humane and dignified development in communities affected by mining.

 8. With specific reference to the alleged human rights violations we wish to re-echoe our earlier demand for:

• Mining companies to cease forthwith any further violations of community rights, and also tactics that serve as enclosures to legitimate demands of communities.
• The Minister of Defence to investigate the pattern of alleged human rights abuses involving the military against people living in communities affected by mining and to take appropriate steps to address the abuses as well as the concerns raised by the victims.
• The Minister of Interior to investigate alleged human rights abuses of communities by the police and to take appropriate steps to address the abuses and concerns of the victims.
• Parliament to raise questions regarding such violent and human rights abuses, and also put in place measures to minimise and eventually stop mining related incidences of violence and human rights violations.

We express our unflinching solidarity with all victims of mining operations in Ghana and reaffirm our commitment and dedication to continue to work with communities affected by mining and victims of mining related human rights abuses in drawing attention to their plight and in the delivery of justice.

We wish to call on the media to continue to echo our demands.

Thank you