The Cardinal Namdini Mining Limited, a subsidiary of Shandong Gold, in the Talensi District, Upper East Region, has relocated 115 families in two communities to make way for its mining activities.
At the new settlement, the Company provided healthcare facilities, water, schools, electricity among other basic social amenities to enhance the living conditions of 62 and 53 families at the Biung and Accra Site communities in the District.
In an interview with journalists at a ceremony to hand over the facilities, Mr Luis Santana, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Cardinal Namdini Mining Limited, said the resettlement project was planned to improve the housing infrastructure of the beneficiary communities.
He said structures to make life comfortable for the 115 families in the two communities were provided without any interference with the way of life and social activities of the people, a reason he noted the Company invested heavily to provide access roads apart from the basic social amenities.
“The project was planned to improve housing infrastructure without necessarily changing the way of life and social interaction of the project affected people, and in a more cost-effective way of providing urban-type services,” Mr Santana said.
However, even though the Company was yet to commence full scale mining activities in the District, it was the first Company to commence the resettlement project per the mining regulations as compared others mining companies that have been operating over a decades now.
He said Cardinal Namdini Mining Limited was poised to introduce the concept of sustainability to mitigate the impact of involuntary resettlement by putting in place livelihood restoration and vulnerable assistance programmes aimed at economic empowerment and social enhancement of the affected people within the mining area.
The CEO said Biung, one of the beneficiary communities on the livelihood restoration programme, benefitted from agricultural extension and tractor services, farm tools and other agricultural inputs including maize, millet, beans and groundnut seeds for improved agriculture.
He told journalists that the Company had engaged the services of the Widows and Orphans Movement, a local Non-Governmental Organisation in the Region to implement a programme dubbed “Vulnerable Assistance” to support vulnerable households during the resettlement period.
Mr Santana said the move was to cushion vulnerable households within the two beneficiary communities against any shock and hardship with packages such as healthcare services, food ration, micro enterprise development among others to enable them become self-sufficient.
He disclosed that the Company as part of the resettlement package, was undertaking the construction of 25 kilometres road at the cost of US$7million to link several communities to the Bolgatanga-Tamale highway through to Balungu, Yindoore, Shia and several other adjoining communities to the Company’s operation area.
Mr Santana was hopeful that movement within the nearby communities and activities of the Company would be improved if the road was eventually completed.
Source: mywordfmonline.com Gaspard Ayuureneeya