Umaru Napoleon Advocates For Environmental Responsibility And Cooperation at Mining Indaba Symposium

Deputy Minister of Mineral Resources, Umaru Napoleon Koroma has told a gathering of African mines ministers that mining companies have a bigger responsibility to protect the environment as a sure way of preventing environmental disasters in the continent.

Koroma who spoke at the first day of Ministerial Symposium of African Ministers of Mines at the Mining Indaba in Cape Town South Africa also drew his colleague’s attention to the overriding need to protect the rights of mining companies that adheres to stipulated laws and are very much committed to the development the communities they operate in.

In the second day of the Mining Indaba, Deputy Minister Umaru Napoleon Koroma joined his peers from Nigeria, Malawi, Uganda, DR Congo, Chad, South Sudan, and Somalia to sign a landmark agreement for the establishment of the African Minerals Strategic Group. The group among other things, will strengthen mining cooperation among member countries. Specifically, it will support and promote exploration, extraction, production, local processing/value addition and the commercialization of major minerals.

The Deputy Minister who has been a major driving force in transforming the country’s mineral sector believe Sierra Leone has entered into a new chapter as the country is now poised to mark its footprints in the sands of time by setting and dictating the terms on which her minerals are extracted, processed and marketed.

“Sierra Leone is very much on the stage here, and we will tell our own story in our own way as we are poised to deliver….” he emphasized. He concluded by reminding prospective investors in the sector to take heed of the value addition message as Africa is no longer willing to mortgage her mineral resources for pittance.

Notable among other key speakers at the event was President of Namibia, Cyril Ramaphosa who shared a compelling account of how indegenous ownership of South African mines rose from a ridiculous 2% in the apartheid era to a staggering 39% in present day. The mining Indaba continues and will end on the 10th February, 2024.