By Foday Moriba Conteh
During a well-attended Press Conference held on the 17th May, 2021 at the Sierra Leone Association of Journalists Hall on Campbell Street in Freetown the Kwabena Resources Limited disclosed that they are set to invest millions of Leones in Valunia Chiefdom if granted a concession license to undertake full scale gold mining operations within the Chiefdom.
Updating the Press on the mining lease application for the Bahumahum mines, the Chief Executive Officer of the City Voice Newspaper, Emmanuel Stanford, revealed that his institution has been investigating the said issue of the granting of mining licenses to companies that have manifested interest to go into operations.
He said based on investigation they were able to unearth certain things about the said mining companies furthering that according to their findings they arrived at the following conclusion:
That Kwabena Resources Limited has disclosed that they are ready and willing to invest millions of Leones in Valunia Chiefdom if granted the concession license to carry out full scale Gold Mining operation in the Chiefdom, adding how it was stated that in less than two years the company will commence large scale gold production in the country.
He also added that the company has also disclosed that it has up to 250 million United States dollar to invest in Valunia Chiefdom adding how the company will also provide more than 400 jobs for young people with a pledge of 20-40 million dollars as annual royalty payment to Government furthering that the company will also pay 4 Million Dollars advance payment to the Community Development Fund.
Emmanuel Stanford also pointed out that the company also has a Community Development Action Plan in place among which is the preservation of the Kangari Hills Forestry Reserve, adding that 4-5 million dollar shares will be put in a Trust for the benefit of Sierra Leoneans.
He said they believe that the company has the financial capacity and technical expertise than all the other companies that applied for license to undertake such large scale mining in that chiefdom.
The City Voice CEO also disclosed that four companies applied to Government for concession license. He then urged Government to award the license to the company that is ready to work in the interest of the people.
He revealed that during their investigations they noticed that Plateau Gold Limited which, supposedly, later changed its name to FG Gold Limited, submitted an application for an Environmental License on the 11th November 2020 when the Baomahun Company secured a license for another company called Algom.
He also maintained that Plateau Gold Limited has Kosonike Koso-Thomas as the only shareholder registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission also adding that Nani Gopal Chakrabory is again the only shareholder registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission.
He said that when Plateau Gold Limited supposedly changed its name to FG Gold Limited it appeared that it never happened since there is no paper trail at the company registry to show that Plateau Gold Limited changed its name to FG Gold Limited because according to him FG Gold Limited was registered in January 2021 as a new company and according to the Corporate Affairs Commission if there was a change of name that should be in the file of Plateau Gold Limited.
In his conclusion he said Plateau Gold Limited appears not to have changed its name to FG Gold Limited as per existing legal records at the Corporate Affairs Commission, adding that the company has not shown evidence of National Protected Area Authority (NPAA) clearance furthering that they have also failed to avail a ESHIA report to the public before public disclosure meetings as required by law.
It was at that juncture that he urged the Government of Sierra Leone to do due diligence in granting a concession License to companies to carry out full scale Gold Mining operations in the Chiefdom of which he said the Government should consider a company that will work for the interest of the people, adding that some of the companies vying for the concession license have been awarded exploration license for over 5 years, but have not made any meaningful development in their areas of operations but instead they have only exploited the resources of the people and failed to honour their obligations to the landowners as well as their Corporate Social Responsibilities.
