The economic exploitation of Guyana’s precious metals sector cannot be allowed to proceed without taking stock of the need to be mindful of the safety considerations that must be applied in the mining sector, Minister in the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment Simona Broomes told Stabroek Business on Tuesday in the wake of Monday’s mining accident at Mahdia, in which a 19-year-old labourer lost his life.
“If we are going to talk about how important the gold-mining sector is to the Guyana economy we are also going to have to say—in the same breath—what we are prepared to do to make gold recovery safer for the people who work in the sector,” Broomes said.
“It is not any single factor. In some cases, unfortunately, it is about putting profit before human life. But it goes beyond that. Sometimes we find cases where the people who run mining operations may simply not be particularly experienced people. There are other cases in which training is lacking. Training has to start with the management of these mining operations but it also has to go down to the people who take the risks. We really need to be arriving at a position where the people who are going below the surface must themselves be able to identify unacceptable risks and raise these issues with the decision-makers in the mining operations.”
Broomes, herself an experienced miner, told Stabroek Business that safety in the mining sector is a dual responsibility. “We can say all we want about safety-related official oversight and about the need for the enforcement of the law, the fact of the matter is that the owners and managers of these operations must take some responsibility. They must have a sense of the importance of human lives. Sometimes I think that we must begin to try to look more closely at the mind set of some of the people who are running mining operations. You have to have an understanding of the human side of this kind of business,” Broomes said, adding that she believed it was appropriate to apply the same sentiments to the construction and other sectors where we are also “challenged” by a number of workplace accidents.
Stressing that she would not be drawn “this early,” into making a judgement on last Monday’s fatal accident, Broomes said that what is important is that we commit ourselves to investigating mining accidents thoroughly, making the findings public and making decisions based on what we find. “If there are cases where laws have been broken or people in charge have been negligent then those responsible must be made to pay the appropriate penalty. I say that without apology,” she said.
The minister said too that mining accidents must continue to provide lessons for both the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission and the mining community as a whole. “Those are the entities with the overall responsibility. They have to train and to sensitise. They have to change the culture. “We have to arrive at a point where it is generally understood that there is no room in the mining sector for business owners who refuse to take on board the environmental and human safety elements in gold mining. It is not just the government but the mining community as a whole that must take steps to outlaw that attitude that is focused only on the gold that comes out of the ground.”
Broomes said she was also aware of the concern of both President David Granger and Natural Resources Minister Raphael Trotman about the safety and environment issues associated with gold mining. “There are concerns at official levels. We would find it entirely unacceptable if we were to just continue to lose people to mining accidents and to wake up the next day as if nothing has happened. That is not what this administration is about. Going forward I think we also need to give more thought to the welfare of the families that are left in grief and sometimes without a breadwinner when these accidents happen. I believe that we need to have regulations, laws even, that require owners of mining operations to have formal arrangements with their employees … for appropriate compensation.
We may not be able to restore life but the least we can do is to have a system that helps protect the welfare of those who are left behind,” Broomes said.
