RISKY BUSINESS: ALPHAMIN ' S DRC MINING GAMBLE
Workers for Alphamin Bisie Mining built a 32 kilometer access road to the Bisie tin deposit
for gold, tin, tungsten and tantalum sourced from the DRC or an adjoining country.
The idea is that transparency in value chains will weed out conflict minerals, starving the groups that depend on their revenues. This is much easier to do in theory than in practice.
At present more than 50 different armed groups still operate in the DRC ' s borderlands, often forcing the local population to join their ranks, participate in their military and logistical activities or to turn a blind eye to criminal activities. Determining loyalties, as well as origins of mineral exports, is difficult in this fluid context.
Henri Ladyi, who leads the Centre Résolution Conflits( CRC) peace group in North Kivu, says that rebel groups have been forcibly recruiting workers and fighters during a string of bloody raids in 2015 and 2016. They target and kidnap“ strong young people” who, after being trained in the bush, are used to help the militias.
He says armed groups also try to trick younger recruits into joining them.“ Some local people are getting information that there are number of [ plots ] available for them for agriculture, so they are moving from their village into the zone that is controlled by rebels,” he says. Criminalised rebel groups can pose as credible employers or protectors because many young Congolese have grown up with the instability caused by these armed groups and see the situation as normal. There are also very few legitimate alternatives in North Kivu, exacerbating the conflict and risks for companies that come into the areas.
Bjorn van Wees, Africa analyst at the Economist Intelligence Unit, does not think that the arrival of a large Western mining company like Alphamin will make much of a difference to the employment prospects of young people in the region.“ Investment projects are clearly a very important part of any peacebuilding process. The creation of jobs and revenue-generating activities can help boost stability. Unfortunately in the DRC, the authorities are ill-equipped to make good use of the revenues generated by mining projects,” he says.
He also warns that bringing in a project of this scale and then failing to live up to local expectations can have serious consequences.“ A failure by the government to ensure that benefits from the new tin mine... go beyond jobs could heighten tensions if government revenues from the project are not invested back into the community,” he points out.
Breaking the longstanding link between the area’ s abundant natural resources, illicit smuggling networks and armed groups will only happen if the DRC’ s government can provide the security that legitimate large and small employers need to return to the area.
Until then, the only companies that will venture out to North Kivu will be the ones like Alphamin who can afford to bring their own private security with them – and even then their ventures will be met with scepticism in many quarters. – This report if from ThisIsAfrica
2016 | Business Times Africa 45