Two gold miners have taken legal action against the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) and the Minister of Natural Resources; who they say have unlawfully ordered their 32 mining claims to be shut down.
They say that an offer of alternative lands by the minister cannot suffice; given their investment in the 32 claims.
It is against this background that they are seeking an injunction against both the minister and Commission, from taking any further steps to shutter their operations.
Milton Brandford and Ayudhia Narine have advanced that as the legal owners of all 32 gold claims at the centre of the litigation, the minister’s order ought to be quashed; and that the court declare them the lawful owners.
They depose in their fixed date application (FDA), that back in August, minister Vickram Bharrat, made an order with retroactive effect from March 1st, of last year, that all 32 of their mining claims located at 14 Mile Issano, Mazaruni Mining District, Karouni, be closed.
It is against this background that the miners (Applicants) are seeking among other things, an order of mandamus to compel the GGMC and the minister to take what they say are “all steps necessary,” in ensuring that the licences for the 32 claims are favourably processed.
The miners have submitted through their attorney Siand Dhurjon, that while they were never granted the claim licences, they nonetheless hold the claims as permitted in Section 2 of the Mining Act.
That section they note, includes “any claim located pursuant to a prospecting permit, whether a claim licence has been issued or not.”
On this point they contend that “at all material times, they possessed and used a valid prospecting permit to prospect the lands,” which they further add, allows them to “work the ground located thereunder from the date of location until his application for a claim licence can be published and such licence either issued or refused.”
Furthermore, they argue that all gold retrieved from the claims, before the grant of a licence is “to be dealt with as though (it was) obtained after a licence was granted.”
This principle they say, is in keeping with Regulation 19 of the Mining Regulations.
To the action filed a week ago, Dhurjon in a release to the press on behalf of his clients, said that they took steps to locate the claims since back in April of this year, and have since made considerable investments in locating and developing them.
The release said that although applications for the 32 licences were properly made since back in June, to date the applications for the licences have neither been granted nor denied.
Brandford and Narine said that instead, the GGMC issued the order given by Bharrat, and even went as far as to break down their camps.
According to the miners the GGMC thought that the lands belonged to Troy Resources Guyana Inc.
Brandford and Narine said, however, that the lands were abandoned since 2016 by another company—Kaburi Development Company— “and were therefore available for the taking according to law.”
The litigants said that they have made continued efforts to appeal to both the minister and GGMC, but have been unsuccessful, eventually learning of the gazetted order issued by Bharrat to shut down all 32 of their claims and all operations.
According to Brandford and Narine, Bharrat has ordered that operations on the claims should be carried out only by government or government-related entities; even as they advanced that the order was backdated to March 1st, 2022 “in a deliberate bid to disenfranchise them of their claims.
Counsel for the Applicants has submitted that the minister’s order “is bad” not only because of its retroactive nature, but also on account of what Dhurjon said is obstruction of the vested rights of the Applicants to their claims.
According to the counsel, the minister’s order was among other things, ultra vires, unreasonable, irrational and in breach of his statutory duty, being without any legal foundation or authority whatsoever.
Brandford and Narine have stated in their FDA that the process of verification by the GGMC was successfully completed and that GGMC’s next step was to be the Gazetting of their claims after allowing for a period for public objections.
This process they said, however, never came to fruition.
Brandford and Narine have said that Bharrat, at his end of year press conference, on 15th November, 2023, admitted that “as government we’ve identified an area within the Karouni area, the former Troy Resources property, and we are allocating claims to Guyanese small miners”.
They said the minister further went on to state, “to date we have awarded over 50 claims to over 50 local miners. Right. And this process is being done by way of a lottery. So, it’s a fair process where small miners are given an opportunity to put their hand in a box and pull a claim. Many of them have already moved into the area and started to mobilise.”
According to the litigants, it is clear that the minister has breached his own purported order, by granting claims in respect of the areas shut down from mining.
They said that the claims issued by the lottery were given to “private individuals and not the government or by a public corporation or by a corporate body in which controlling interest vests in the State or in any agency on behalf of the State,” as is required by his purported order.
The miners have lamented that to date, in spite of their legal correspondence to the Commissioner of GGMC and the minister; outlining their legitimate expectations and threatening legal action; neither has responded.
They said that instead the Commissioner issued a press release addressing the matter and trivializing their rights over the claims.
Brandford and Narine said that while the minister has made them several offers of alternative land as compensation; with a view to settling, they have had to refuse, owing to what they say is their investment already made in the 32 claims.
It is against this background that the miners are seeking among other things, an injunction restraining both Bharrat and the Commission from taking steps to dismantle or otherwise interfere with the operations of what they said are their claims.
They also want the Minister and GGMC to be restrained from awarding licences to those claims to any other entity.
The matter comes up for hearing on January 18th, 2024, before acting Chief Justice Roxane George SC.
