African Minerals claims on corporate social responsibility

African Minerals claims on corporate social responsibility:

Separating fact from fiction

By Theophilus S. Gbenda (Moe Fire)

(Chairman: Association of Journalists on Mining and Extractives or AJME)

African Minerals, one of the major players in Sierra Leone’s mining sector, boasts on its website [http://www.african-minerals.com/] that, “As a socially responsible organization and one of the largest employers in Sierra Leone, African Minerals Limited is continually implementing social development programmes within Sierra Leone to support communities in its operational areas and to compliment government’s development initiatives across the country.”

            To reassure shareholders who might be concerned about the potentially negative effects of mining and extractive activities in a country still healing from the ravages of an 11-year civil war that ended in 2002 and costing the lives of nearly 200,000 Sierra Leoneans and foreigners alike , the African Minerals website makes several claims about its “corporate social responsibility” in the area of its iron ore concession in Tonkolili District in northern Sierra Leone, underneath a truly paternalistic photo showing lovely young schoolgirls being smiled down upon by a European man.

            So just how true are those claims, as they appeared on the company’s website in 2009? And did African Minerals deserve to win, in November 2009, the “Most Effective Corporate Social Responsibility Project” that it was awarded at the Planet Earth Lisbon event in Portugal? An in-depth investigation in the area by AJME in 2009, just weeks before African Minerals won this award, unearthed some hard truths about the company’s social responsibility claims.

African Minerals Claim 1

“Provision of sustainable safe drinking water for local communities (Kalasogiai Chiefdom, Tonkolili District)

The challenges in establishing sustainable water supplies in remote rural settlements are substantial and the critical state of rural water supply and sanitation systems has been a major cause of the high incidence of infectious and parasitical diseases.

In 2007, the Company [African Minerals] provided treated gravity flow drinking water for three communities in the Tonkolili area, at the Sonkoni, Kagbema and Ferengbeya villages. The Company has allocated further annual funding towards maintaining this supply.

Appropriate water safety plans and community initiatives such as community hygiene education and public awareness of water safety have been instituted as an outreach programme.”

AJME findings on Claim 1:

The only community in which you could find such a water system is Ferengbeya, where the company’s operations are headquartered in the Kalasogia Chiefdom, Tonkolili District. AJME found that the other two communities mentioned in the claim (Sonkoni and Kagbema) completely lack any source of water provided by the company and residents in these communities were in fact displeased to hear that African Minerals is making such a claim.

            Running water pumps could be found at strategic places at Ferengbeya, but AJME learned that these were only provided after the people there staged a demonstration against the pollution by African Minerals of their only available water source.

            One of the authorities who was among those who went to Ferengbeya to address the demonstrators, Councillor Thomas Amadu Turay of Ward 227 in Bumbuna town, informed AJME that the indigenes of Ferengbeya staged a peaceful protest against the company for polluting their only source of water and reneging on its promise to provide them an alternative one. Councillor Thomas Amadu Turay said the people also demonstrated against the company’s intrusion into their lands without due compensation. He affirmed that the current water supply system at Ferengbeya came shortly after the demonstration.

In Sonkoni Village for example, where the company claimed to have extended a similar gesture, the only source of water available there comes from underneath a rock that flows down in a stream. The only modern water source at Sonkoni was provided by the state-owned National Commission for Social Action (NaCSA) in 2003, and has since broken down.

Apart from the provision of water for the Ferengbeya community, nothing else in Claim 1 is true, beginning with the so-called allocation of further annual funding towards maintaining the water supply, to putting in place appropriate water safety plans and community initiatives such as community hygiene education and public awareness of water safety, which African Minerals claimed to have instituted as an outreach programme.

In fact the company has no dealings with the community people. They only have business with the paramount chiefs and key money-seeking politicians from the area.

African Minerals Claim 2

“Construction and maintenance of roads and bridges serving local communities

Infrastructure development and maintenance is important to Sierra Leone as it strives to encourage growth. The construction of a good road network across the country stimulates the rapid availability of agricultural produce, which in turn enables farmers to maximise profits and generally improves standards of living within the community. Since its inception in 2003 the Company has, with this in mind, undertaken road construction and maintenance as a priority in its areas of operation.

The Company has helped towns and village communities with their road networks. One town to benefit from this is the Lunsar Township, Marampa Chiefdom in the Port Loko District. The Company provided funding for a street resurfacing project, where a number of streets were resurfaced by the young people of the town, in collaboration with the Marampa Development Association.

Currently, the Company is rebuilding a 15 km road, which was formerly one of the most dangerous roads in the country. This road, which links the upper end of Tonkolili with the rest of Tonkolili District, has been virtually impassable for the last forty years. To date, the Company has contributed US$50,000 to labour and equipment to rebuild the road, including civil works such as suitable drainage and culverts.”

AJME findings on Claim 2:

Yes, it is true that the company has undertaken and is undertaking the rehabilitation of roads in its operational areas. But the million-dollar question is who benefits most from the roads rehabilitation efforts?  It is also true that the roads are serving community needs, but to what extent? 

The locals were not involved in the designing of the roads (assuming that they are the long-term beneficiaries). Musa Thorlie, an aide to the Town Chief of Kagbema Village, Tamba Thorlie, described the road network as a good thing for the community, but noted that the work was not done in the way they as indigenes of the land would have preferred.

According to Mr. Thorlie, the roads are without culverts, something he noted has a negative effect on their farm activities especially during the rains. He stated categorically that the community has never received what the company claimed to have provided them in its website. He went on to state that sometime in 2007 the community approached the company with a request for the provision of a school, VIP toilets and a hand pump. African Minerals, he said, turned down the request outright on grounds that the community is too small for such facilities. The said community has a population of over 100, the majority of whom are elderly and children.

In the Lunsar township where the company claimed to have collaborated with an organization known as the Marampa Development Association (MDA) to undertake the resurfacing of roads in the Lunsar Township, the truth is quite the opposite.

Yes, it is true that roads are being resurfaced in the Lunsar Township, but African Minerals is not playing any significant role in getting the work done.

The company’s claim that it is working in close collaboration with the Marampa Development Association to undertake the roads resurfacing is also not true, as the so-called Marampa Development Association is non-existent. Local sources said the group used to exist, but died out years and years ago. One of the key groups presently existing in the township is known as the Marampa Descendants Development Association (MDDA), whose main objective, according to its coordinator, Mohamed Alie Kanu, aims to improve the status of the township.

AJME investigations showed that African Minerals, rather than working with the community as a whole, is instead working with individuals referred to as “betrayers” by their own fellow indigenes, who accuse the company of promoting and sustaining the divide-and-rule policy.

African Minerals Claim 3

“Developing the educational sector in remote areas of the country

The GoSL has pledged that by 2025 it will have implemented country-wide provision of basic education for all children. This initiative resulted from the recognition that pupils were undertaking schooling in poor conditions or were unable to access places of learning. In certain cases, children have to complete lessons in makeshift buildings with little or no furniture. There are particular groups, including the poor, the rural population living in isolated areas, the physically challenged and orphaned children, who are particularly disadvantaged in terms of access to educational facilities.

During 2007, the Company donated school furniture and learning materials to 10 schools in the Northern and Eastern provinces of the country. 250 school benches were also provided to three schools in the Kalasogia Chiefdom, Tonkolili District and classrooms were repaired. The recipient schools were the UMC Primary School, Bumbuna Town, DEC Primary School, Sonkoni Village and the UMC Primary School, Ferengbeya. The Company is also providing supplementary funds to the UMC Primary School Ferengbeya village to encourage qualified teachers to take up teaching positions in the village school.”

AJME findings on Claim 3

None of the schools mentioned on the African Minerals website exists. The schools that are actually operating in the areas mentioned are the Baptist Primary School and Ahmadiyya Primary School at Sonkoni; the Baptist Primary School at Ferengbeya and the four schools in Bumbuna Town: Baptist Primary School, Roman Catholic Primary School, Ahmadiyya Primary School and the Saint Mathews Junior Secondary School. AJME investigations showed that some of these schools have actually received some assistance from African Minerals in the form of learning and teaching materials, which could be estimated at less than $200 per school, per year. No school furniture was given to any school in the chiefdom, as claimed by the company.

The company also claimed that it is providing supplementary funds to the UMC Primary School at Ferengbeya to encourage qualified teachers to take up teaching positions in the village school. AJME established without a doubt that there is no school at Ferengbeya called UMC Primary School, but found that the company is indeed taking care of the emolument of the teachers at the Baptist Primary School, the only school operating at Ferengbeya.

Edward Sahr Fatouma, a teacher at the Baptist Primary School at Ferengbeya who happens to be one of the teachers African Minerals is catering for, agreed — when squeezed by a string of questions — that he is an untrained and unqualified teacher brought from Freetown and that he receives the sum of 150,000 Leones (slightly above $50 at the time) as monthly emolument from the company. He said four teachers are running the school, with African Minerals paying all four of them, including the Head Teacher, Pastor Peter K. Bangura, the sum of 800,000 Leones (about $210) per month.  Mr. Fatouma felt the amount was too small.

African Minerals Claim 4

“Nationwide scholarship programmes

In 2005, the Company instituted the Kono District Scholarship Scheme, which has now become a nationwide scholarship programme geared towards helping the underprivileged and disadvantaged.

In September and October of 2007, the Company contributed towards scholarship funds and programmes in the Kono, Tonkolili and Bombali Districts. Study materials and funding were donated and 375 pupils from the three districts benefited by receiving one year’s tuition fees, educational literature and other school materials.”

AJME findings on Claim 4

Councillor Thomas Amadu Turay of Ward 227 Constituency 66 in Bumbuna Town confirmed the granting of 350 scholarships by African Minerals to the Tonkolili District in 2008. He said the scholarships were distributed thus: Sama Bendugu Chiefdom – 100; Kalansogia Chiefdom – 100; Kafe Simira Chiefdom – 100 and Kholifa Rowala Chiefdom 50. He also confirmed that the scholarships were given on the condition that the company reserves the right to withhold the gesture if the beneficiaries perform below the expected standards. He had no idea whatsoever about the amount of money involved.

African Minerals Claim 5

“Kalasogia Chiefdom, Tonkolili District

In association with the Government’s drive to improve Sierra Leone’s infrastructure, the Company contributed to the development of infrastructure in the Tonkolili District. In August 2007, the Company contributed towards the rehabilitation of the Bumbuna Central Market in Bumbuna Town, Kalasogia Chiefdom, where the Company operates its iron ore exploration project. The market is the Chiefdom’s central market which was in a poor condition following the conflict. The rehabilitated market when completed will include stores, office accommodation, butchery and 300 market stalls.

In November 2007, the Company provided a contribution towards the rebuilding of the Kalasogia Chiefdom courtroom and donated furniture for the courtroom.”

AJME findings on Claim 5:

The market African Minerals referred to was, AJME learned, rehabilitated not by the company but by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), under its post-conflict community development intervention. According to Councillor Thomas Amadu Turay, “African Minerals did not put there a single cent”. The claim on the web paints a picture that the said market is still under rehabilitation. The fact on the ground is that the market is completed and in use.

            The claim that the company in 2007 contributed to the rebuilding of the Kalansogia Chiefdom Courtroom, is also without an iota of truth. To start with, the said courtroom was constructed by personnel of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces in 2002, and has not been rehabilitated since then because it is still in a fairly good condition. African Minerals started operating in the area in 2005, three years after the building had been put up. No furniture was ever provided for the said facility as claimed by African Minerals. The irony is that African Minerals uses the Court Barry (chiefdom courtroom) for public events and pays nothing to the community for the use of the facility.

African Minerals Claim 6

“Provision of emergency response aid

The Company has a small emergency response team set up to provide medical emergency support and evacuation at our areas of operation. During 2007, 20 houses in the villages of Wandugu and Kemadugu were destroyed by a bush fire. The Company provided emergency aid in the form of food, building materials, beds and mattresses to the families affected by the fire.”

AJME findings on Claim 6

AJME could find no evidence that any such assistance was ever received. The victims told AJME that they were simply abandoned to their fate by both the company and their chiefdom authorities. African Minerals, for example, donated only two bags of rice to the over 300 fire victims at Wandugu and nothing else as claimed. People in Kemadugu Village said they received absolutely nothing from African Minerals by way of assistance. Investigations also proved that the only major fire in the area in 2007 was the one at Wandugu Village, where over 30 houses were burnt down. This is contrary to the African Minerals claim that only 20 houses were affected. The people of Wandugu told AJME that they are however grateful to African Minerals for transforming what used to be a local and broken bridge into a modern and enviable one for a village setting. The said bridge stands in the middle of the only route leading inside and outside Wandugu Village. The community, at the time of these investigations, had only three indigenes in the employ of African Minerals.

African Minerals Claim 7

“Promoting sport country-wide

In conjunction with the Government’s efforts to achieve the objectives set out in its national youth policy, the Company embarked on improving sport in the country by promoting, providing, assisting and organising several sporting functions and disciplines. In October 2007, African Minerals provided financial support to the East End Lions Football Club, one of the most popular and successful football clubs in Sierra Leone. The Company donated US$15,000 to the club to enable it to compete in the African Club Champions League. The Company also sponsors the club by donating US$60,000 per year towards its running costs.

African Minerals also organises and supports annual football galas in certain areas in which it operates. At the end of 2007, a Christmas and New Year Gala between Bumbuna Town, Samaia Bendugu Town and the District football team, the Tonkolili Stars, was sponsored by the Company.”

AJME findings on Claim 7

AJME finds that African Minerals has been really generous to East End Lions. Apart from supporting the club with the lump sum of $ US 60,000/00 (Sixty Thousand United Dollars) to enable it participate in the tournament mentioned in the claim, the company also provided a capacity fund to the club to the tune of $ US 60,000/00 for a one year period. This is however no longer the case as AJME learned that the said amount is now being split among three different football clubs: East End Lions, Marampa Stars of Lunsar and Golden Dragon of Tonkolili. This was confirmed by journalist Sorie Ibrahim Sesay, who happens to be the Assistant Secretary of East End Lions. Each of the said clubs gets the sum of Le 5, 000, 000, 000 /00 (Five Million Leones or about $US 1,125) per month or $ 20,000/00 (Twenty Thousand United States Dollars per year) as intuitional support from African Minerals. The change of mind by African Minerals amounts to a breach of an earlier gentleman’s agreement between it and the East End Lions Football Club that the latter will receive from the former the sum of $5,000,000 (Five Thousand United States Dollars) monthly, amounting to $ 60,000 (Sixty Thousand Dollars a year) as gift, as claimed on the website herein referred to. It is therefore only true to state that East End Lions Football Club received up till December 2009, the sum of $ 60,000/00 from African Minerals, and that the said amount is now being split into three parts or among three different clubs.    

            On the claim about promoting sporting activities in the Tonkolili District, AJME’s investigations in the area showed that African Minerals had no hand whatsoever in the 2007 Christmas and New Year Gala that it referred to on its website. As a matter of fact, this was organized and sponsored by an indigenous group called MABBEN Football Association, comprising three chiefdoms in the general area. The Chairman of MABBEN, Ansumana D. Mansaray, grew furious on the phone line when AJME put it to him that African Minerals was the sponsor of the said gala.

Hard truths and fictional claims

AJME is concerned that African Minerals appears to be taking undue credit for the efforts of others, in its bid to create an impression in the outside world that it is committed to its corporate social responsibility; the deceptive tactic used to attract the prestigious award earlier referred to. What is crucial to note is that what the company puts out on its website often contradicts what it tells people on the ground.

It appears that African Minerals is taking advantage of the fact that the vast majority of the people affected by their operations do not have access to the internet. The fact that nobody is monitoring what goes up on the websites of suspicious or distrustful companies such as African Minerals that often choose to work in impoverished states with weak institutions and oversight, gives them carte blanche to manipulate public opinion — both that of shareholders and of people affected by their very operations on the ground.

AJME feels strongly that the company is taking advantage of the poverty of the people in Tonkolili. For example, African Minerals contracted about 300 able-bodied indigenes of the affected communities for a drilling job. They were paid 12,000 Leones per day (about 3 US$), and had to work very hard from 8:00am to 4:00pm. With no provision for transportation, the said workers had to walk everyday on shanks mere feet for long distances to and from work. All those contracted under the drilling phase were sacked almost immediately the work was finished. They were not entitled to any facility whatsoever, and were of course given no benefits after eight months of hard work. On its website, the company claimed to be according its workers the best of treatments. Only recently, indigenous youths in the affected communities staged a protest against the company, claiming that they are being sidelined when it comes to employment. Workers have no job security as they could be fired anytime. They are not therefore expected to openly voice out their grievances for fear of being sacked.

On the whole, the investigations found the said claims to be a curious and very troubling mix of facts, often exaggerated and spun to create an impression of corporate largesse that did not exist, and outright fiction. Hardly the award-winning corporate social responsibility presented on the website!