Miners and senior members of the security forces have pledged to meet on a more regular basis to iron out ways in which recommendations for the security of miners will be implemented.
The Guyana Gold and Diamond Miners Association (GGDMA) has on several occasions placed on record its concerns about security and underscored this position at its recent Annual General Meeting, making it clear that they felt that their security needs were not being met.
On Tuesday executives of the association met with Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee. According to GINA Rohee pointed out that meetings with the association first started in February this year following the killings at Bartica and stakeholders in the mining sector had agreed to increase co-operation to enhance security in mining communities.
GINA said those stakeholders included the Miners Association, the Guyana Geology and Mines Com-mission (GGMC), the Office of the Prime Minister and the Home Affairs Ministry.
However speaking with this newspaper on Wednesday, GGDMA secretary Edward Shields noted that it was just a question of implementation of many measures already mapped out in a series of recommendations to ensure miners’ security. To this end he said the major thing coming out of the meeting was a commitment by stakeholders to meet on a more regular basis to deal with the implementation of recommendations made by a committee which was set up to examine ways of improving security for miners.
According to him there may have been a breakdown of communication somewhere as it related to the earlier implementation of the recommendations but it is expected the frequent meetings would iron this out.
“So we are basically just getting back on board with what was started,” he said.
The first step that will mark the pledge by the stakeholders is a closed door meeting with Acting Police Commissioner Henry Greene slated for July 26. Moreover, he said, Rohee has informed them that if there is any trouble he was just a telephone call away and they should not hesitate to call him.
“Altogether I would say that the meeting was fruitful. Our concerns have already been registered and so we will see now how everything comes together,” he said.
At its AGM last week, association president Alfro Alphonso had pointed out that the incident at Lindo creek could have occurred at any other mining camp, adding that it was clear that security was still a major issue for miners but this was not receiving as much attention as it needed.
The association’s members also pointed to a number of illegal Brazilian operations which needed to be regularized, the delay in accessing of firearm licences by miners although they own dredges and a number of other security issues which they felt were not being looked after.
