The Wednesday ‘clinics’ on the premises of the Guyana Geology & Mines Commission (GGMC) hosted by Minister in the Ministry of Natural Resources & the Environment Simona Broomes have positioned her at a juncture between workers and management with which she has become familiar.
At the GGMC last Wednesday, though, she appeared thoroughly at ease, comfortable, perhaps, in an environment that she has come to understand over the years. There were men and women, employees and claim holders, who had showed up at the ‘clinic’ with problems and she addressed them all with a fluency that could only have been born out of familiarity.
Afterwards, she spoke with Stabroek Business about the nature of the problems with an unhesitant frankness. She believes that the sector continues to experience the bullying of small miners by “the bigger players,” pointing to an example that had been illustrated during the earlier meeting. “Those practices can only be curbed by management and monitoring,” she says.
Her wish, she says, is that the gold-mining sector moves with haste towards becoming a rules-based sector, arguing that its very nature dictates that it be governed by rules. “A great many of the wrongs that are committed result from a failure to follow rules,” she says.
On Wednesday, a week ago, a handful of women had attended the ‘clinic’ to get the minister’s ear. They told their stories without interruption, clearly comfortable in the presence of an authority figure whom they had known ‘in another life,’ as president of the Guyana Women Miners Organisation (GWMO). One particular story about a woman who was deputizing for her sick husband and whose modest claim appeared to have been threatened by a bigger miner appeared to agitate the minister. There is an exchange, the woman appears encouraged and two others in the room are encouraged to tell their stories.
She is keen to talk about the role that the GWMO has been playing in the development of the sector. The mining sector may still be male-dominated but, she says, it is now no longer a question of a handful of women “taking their chances” and being “beaten, robbed and abused.” We have she says, shifted from the time when women who ventured into the goldfields were regarded as prostitutes. “It’s different now. Women are more confident, more sure of themselves,” she adds.
She talks animatedly about plans for the development of a database that tracks the impact of women on the mining sector. “We will record important information about women including the extent of their operations in terms of dredges and equipment. There will also be information on women working at other jobs in the mining sector.”
Inevitably, she arrives at the issue of safety and health and about the indifference of “the bosses.” There are, she says, plans for the creation of a Compliance Section that will attempt to create a rules-based regime in the mining sector. “We are hoping to offer rigorous in-field training, inspection and monitoring and we will enforce penalties for a lack of compliance.”
There is no need for the minister to go through the painful details of the problems in the mining sector. There is corruption and – based on some of the stories that emerge at the ‘clinics’ – what appears to be evidence of instances of perpetrators of wrongdoings in the goldfields turning up with the police in tow. There have been cases, too, in which the GGMC’s Mines Officers have been less than vigilant. The minister lays her cards on the table. “There are corrupt practices in the GGMC. The rotten tomatoes will have to go. We need to correct the things that need correcting and changes are already being made.” By the same token, she says she believes that there are “good, honest and capable technical people” working for the GGMC.
