NMA Director General Julius Mattai, Incites Violence In Port Loko

Gbere Junction police station on Tuesday November 1st 2022 had to immediately respond to a distressed call from workers of Sierramin Bauxite Company, after an Integems Consultancy Company’s worker was seen doing an EIA findings for CTC Mining in their concession.

It’s alleged that the Director General of National Minerals Agency (NMA), Julius Mattai, is the owner of Integems Consultancy Company and that he is using the company to do consultancy for mining companies. He has done a lot of consultancies of which he is doing one for CTC Mining Company which is clearly manifesting conflict of interest.

According to reliable source from Port Loko, one man in a vehicle that introduced himself as Mr. Jaward from the Integems Consultancy firm, who have been hired by CTC Mining to do them EIA findings was intercepted in the concession of the Sierramin Bauxite Company situated around a village called Mabamboo. He explained that he is working under the mandate of the Ministry of Mines.

The source furthered that elders and other stakeholders within the areas concerned have expressed their disappointment in the aforesaid matter and has warned Jaward to stop his work at the moment and revert to the authorities for his safety and security.

However, Jaward complied with the police admonishment but intending to continue his job if only his hirers and stakeholders will ask him to do so. Equally, workers of Sierramin Bauxite Company are also intending to attack any intruder that may enter into their concession in a bid to do any job without the consent of their management. This has posed a serious threat to security that needs an urgent attention to, for the sake of peace and tranquillity.

In that vein, an abstract report has been sent to the Regional Crime Officer Northwest and the Divisional Crime Officer respectively for the attention of the higher authorities.

According to one of the residents in the Marampa Chiefdom who pleaded not to mention his name, they will not allow any other company to conduct EIA findings in the concessions of Sierramin Bauxite Company and they are ready to wage war against violators.

A source very close to the NMA indicates that a Company which was 100% Turkish ownership until 9th September 2022 when 48% was transferred to M.M mining (incorporated on the 2nd September 2022)-Hesham Mackie and his brother with two silent partners with a signed agreement.

“Agreement already signed by the silent partners represented by two Sierra Leoneans, one of them holds a very senior position in government and the other is very close to the government are behind this entire Mackie strategy after talking about the status of the application. The source maintained. “Transfer of shares from CTC to Hesham Mackie for the purposes of this license took place on 9th September 2022. They started preliminary work on its application process as they just completed negotiation with Integems on the 20th September 2022 to undertake their EIA studies,” he noted.

It was also alleged that Mattai and the Ministry of Mines and Mineral Resources have rushed an application for CTC mining company violating the process with so many irregularities to issue out License to the company illegally. The normal process for obtaining a mining license takes months. For a company that was groomed in September, it’s not legally possible to get to the stage of obtaining a mining license by October. These tells you the type of corruptions Mattai and the Ministry of Mines and Mineral Resources have been engaged in .They don’t care about the country neither the government that employed them their only interest is to make money through corrupt means.

The Director General National Minerals Agency (NMA), Julius Mattai, despite the international embarrassments he has caused for Sierra Leone including the one at the community court of justice of ECOWAS in Abuja, Nigeria where a lawsuit was made against the Government of Sierra Leone for unlawfully cancelling ALGOM mining company’s License, after his Integems Company did the consultancy for ALGOM for their EPA license and did the same for a Company named FG Gold that took over the concession that was cancelled, he is busy working for his own interest and undermining the government.

Another related matter was the case of the SL Mining which is now Marampa mines where Mattai pushed for the cancellation of the company’s license, which went for an arbitration and caused the country a lot of embarrassment and resources on legal fees, after a long legal battle and negative international publicity, an out of court settlement was reached causing the country to lose millions in legal fees, loss of revenue etc.

This is not the first time Julius Mattai’s firm Integems Consultant Company has been accused of such corrupt and selfish act, after it was revealed that the company was connected to the study at the behest of Vimetco in the preparedness to hijack the Port Loko asset of Sierramin Bauxite Limited, the criminal nature of a conflict of interest becomes stark.

There was a pattern to these criminal mining’s conduct involving Julius Mattai. We saw similar trend in the case of ALGOM where the application fees of $25k was paid and a fee for the consultancy was paid to Julius Mattai but was delayed and denied the said license so that the NMA favoured company that applied later was granted the EIA study instead. That matter is a subject of litigation at the ECOWAS Court and the evidenced of fraud and corruption is very overwhelming to make the government of Sierra Leone once again loss face.

With all these allegations been made, It’s clear that Mattai is using the Port Loko Bauxite as gold digging for himself doing consultancy for different mining companies just to make money for himself and do not care about the country and the Government that employed him.

The NMA Director General need to be caution so that his selfish deeds may not lead to litigation against Sierra Leone, which will bring another international embarrassment for President Bio’s Government . But again it’s no surprise that Julius Mattai, who was once a devoted member of the National Grand Coalition (NGC) Political Party that did everything possible to prevent President Bio from winning the 2018 national elections, is now undermining the SLPP Government’s New Direction.

Sources close to Sierramin Bauxite Company indicate that the British investors have filed papers for arbitration in London for the unlawful cancellation.

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Meanwhile, efforts have been made to get onto the NMA Director General, Julius Mattai, for his own side of the story, but it remains to be futile as decline to comments.