TAKEOVER OF KETA LAGOON FOR $30,000
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| Dispossed salt miners along the Keta lagoon |
By
Duke Nii Amartey Tagoe
It
has happened again! The pillage goes on and on. The Keta Lagoon in the Volta
Region has been handed over to a salt mining company for $30,000 (Thirty
Thousand Dollars).
The deal between the Ghana Minerals Commission and
Kensington Industries Limited of India, will enable the company grab 7000 acres
of the entire lagoon whilst 300metres at the periphery representing 3 percent
(3%) of the lagoon will be left for the local salt miners.
What is worse, the company has departed from the agreement
it signed with the Minerals Commission to use sea brine for salt production and
has resorted to the use of surface water and underground pool by means of pipes
and very huge pumping machines.
It has also emerged that long before the Kensington Industries
Limited was granted a license to mine salt in the Adina-Denu area, it had
already encroached on lands belonging to the neighboring communities in
flagrant violation of the Mineral and Minning Act.
In a letter dated 18th
November 2009 addressed to the elders of the Dogbekope Community, Rajesh Mehte,
a director of the company, “acknowledged having encroached on their lands
unlawfully without having been granted a license. We apologise and withdraw immediately.”
Below
are statements made by salt miners about the development!
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| Godswill Mawukope |
Godswill Mawukpome
“
More than three thousand people here in Ketu South and from other parts of the
Volta Region derive our livelihood from the Keta Lagoon and that is why we are
heartbroken that a government we have served and supported these many years
could take over this resource and hand it over to some white men. The Indian
Company has been given the entire lagoon and we cannot fish as we used to do
some many years ago. This injustice must be rectified as soon as possible
because hunger is looming at our doorsteps.”
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| Janet Aglado |
JanetAglado
“One of our greatest worries is that the fresh water that
used to flow from Togo into the lagoon, bringing in fish in the rainy season
has been blocked by roads and dams constructed by the company. As a result the
annual fishing and salt winning seasons that used to bring relief to the people
have become a thing of the past since the lagoon dries up prematurely.”
Vincent Gala
“What has happened to us
in this place since the white men from India came here has been an eye opener
and has taught us an important lesson that politicians do not honour their
promises because if they do and they really seek to give us a better life, this
injustice would never have taken place. What prevents the government from
assisting us to do what the white man wants to do with our own salt because
they are not going to cook with the salt in their homes but to sell like we
also do to survive as a people? Between me and the Indian who is more
important? We are the state and every resource is being held for us in trust by
the people we have employed to guide the state. If they do otherwise, then I
think a robbery of the people has taken place.”
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| Janet Atsu |
Janet Atsu
“In
the first place, the communities living along the lagoon were not consulted by
the white men when they decided to take it. It could be that we are not
recognized as the rightful owners or even a people with a stake in this
lagoon. I say this because soon after
the company took over the lagoon, they started an aggression against us by
destroying our salt ponds in which new salt was going to be mined. When we
protested they called in the police and an army of soldiers who came and beat
us up mercilessly. An injustice is being committed here and we expect President
John Dramani Mahama to move in very quickly and take the lagoon back for us
else he would be considered as an accomplice in this crime.”
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| Cynthia Gali |
Cynthia Gali
“It
is highly unthinkable and we would have thought that by now the government,
which we massively support and rally behind, would have made a statement. How
can this government apportion the Keta Lagoon to foreigners to the neglect of
its own people and indigenes who derive their entire livelihood and very
existence from the lagoon?”
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| Evelyn Kamasa |
Evelyn Kamasa
“I
used to come and gather four bowls of salt from here in a day and during the
rainy season, I used a net to catch fish and we set traps to catch crabs and
mudfish. Since the arrival of the Indian company, we can no longer do this and
our livelihoods have been destroyed. Some people sit in Accra without knowledge
of social conditions of this place and yet take decision with adverse effects
on our lives. What else can we do when there are virtually no opportunities for
work in this part of the country? This is absolutely unacceptable and we demand
that the people who claim to lead this country think about how the decisions
they are taking, takes food out of the mouth of the already suffering people.”
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| Elisabeth Gaglo |
Elizabeth Gaglo
“The
area of the lagoon given to the Indian company is just outrageous and the
demarcation must be done again. In any case, the government must consider that
our interest must come first in this matter because we are citizens of this country
and demand that we treated fairly. Kinsington must stop draining the lagoon
water into their saltpans. They must use the sea water they told us they would
use in their operations.”
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| Esinam Kovey |
Esinam Kovey
“Around this time of the
year, we come here and collect salt, so that we can buy a piece of cloth for
our children and pay for their fees when school reopens. Unfortunately, we can
no longer do that at this time of Christmas because the water from the lagoon
that forms the salt has been blocked and diverted into the small dams constructed
by the white men. We do not accept the area of land they have left for us
because we consider it as an insult. We share in this resource and we shall not
allow anyone sitting in Accra to take it away from us and give it a white man.”
Gevornu Stellah
“There
has been a deliberate distortion of what happened here on the 2nd of
December this year. The company decided to construct a road within the lagoon
so that their heavy duty vehicles could move in and collect the salt they have
gathered from one part of the lagoon but in the process of doing so and with
complete disdain for our right to survival, the truck started pushing sand to
cover the little salt we had managed to collect. This provoked everyone because
the poor man’s salt collected through manual labour in this hot sun must not be
treated that way. They are simply seeking to frustrate us to leave, but they
would have to go because we shall take back the lagoon.”
Dakle Elisabeth
“As
a matter of urgency we want the government to come out and explain the extent
of its involvement in this forceful takeover of the Keta Lagoon to the Indian
company because Kensington could not have just walked in here. We are also calling
on President Mahama to intervene and release our brothers who’ve been unjustly
imprisoned by the police. Every day of their imprisonment is breaking the heart
our communities and we demand their release because it is the company that
destroyed and strayed into human settlements. What is happening is a disgrace
for the government and to us the people who’ve sheepishly followed this
government these many years.”
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| Amegah Sena Gideon |
Amegah Senah Gideon
“I am the only educated
member of my family, but I ride a motorbike as my way of making a living to
support my mother. On the 2nd of December, I got to the lagoon with
a passenger only to realize that there were disturbances near the lagoon and a
band of policemen were shooting without aim at everyone they could see. It was
very chaotic and I was frightened. It was after a few moments that I realized
that a bullet had penetrated my neck and had gone through my back. I can no
longer ride the motorbike because I have a bullet wound in my neck and in my
back and it will take some time to heal.”
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| Priscilla Kuglenu |
Priscilla Kuglenu
“Since
the clashes took place on 2nd December, the police have been
deliberately picking up young men in the communities they consider as a threat
to the company but all of them have nothing doing with the matter in concern.
The police and the MCE are trying to intimidate and coerce us into submission
by that will not happen because we shall take back the lagoon.”
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| Torgbi Sape Agbo (V) |
Torgbi Sape Agbo (V)
“The establishment of
Kinsington Industries Limited here to mine salt has brought our people more
pain and so much harm. The aggression of the company against the local people
in their demand for equity of the lagoon is just shocking and annoying. No man
can force us to sit quietly and go hungry whilst foreigners take what must
rightfully belong to everyone in this country. If they have succeeded in using
sheer force in other places to allow for the wanton exploitation of resources,
that would certainly not happen here. I join the youth of Klikor and Somey
traditional areas as the paramount chief of Somey to demand that the Municipal
Chief Executive immediately changes his vindictive stance against us and we
call for the release of all who have been imprisoned over this matter.”
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