Gold Rush in Haiti: Mining Investment Good for Whom?

Ezili Dantò’s Note

Gold Rush in Haiti: Good for whom?

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Haiti 's water supply is ALREADY contaminated by foreign cholera feces, what will leaking cyanide, arsenic emissions, mine waste, Marine ecosystem destruction and open pit mining and unsupervised drilling leave Haiti with up North?

Will the new propose mining laws being drafted by the Martelly government provide MORE legal protection for Haiti? Or, will they simply void the protections that are on the books already but not applied?

What will be different in the new laws and what will the effect be for the people in Haiti? Will Haiti ecosystem, crops, water supply be duly protected. How? And how will the displaced farmers and Haiti in general profit from these new laws? WHO is drafting these laws?

Why isn't the new mining law conversation PUBLIC and soliciting Haiti legitimate public participation.

Haiti: Waiving current law to benefit the global miners and readying bullets for peasants who will protest the looting 

Waiving the current law to benefit the global miners and readying bullets for the peasants who will protest the looting is probably the reason the neoDuvalierist Martelly government is suddenly drafting new Haiti mining laws.

Haiti's current law doesn't allow drilling without a signed mining convention. But Newmont mining got a "waiver" to the current law. Former Minister of Finance Ronald Baudin along with the Minister of Public works helped Newmont and Majesco mining get the  unlawful waiver.

Not that the foreigners have not been digging, drilling and extracting Haiti gold and mineral resources clandestinely since the 2004 Bush regime change and clandestinely exporting it out of the country behind UN barricades, private security planes and logos anyways. It's just that now they've gone public, a semblance of following Haiti laws seems necessary. (The secret behind the Rush to Haiti; All Eyes On Haiti: One Of The Reasons Why The US/UN Rush To Haiti ; Haiti's Riches:Interview with Ezili Dantò on Mining in Haiti.)

Dieuseul Anglade, the then head of Haiti mining objected to the "waiver" charade and was fired by the newly installed prime minister, Laurent Lamothe. 

This is not new, as I reported in 2008 in an interview with Chris Scott:

"in terms of regulation, what happens, nobody knows. The Bureau des Mines...I'll give you an example, the head of the Bureau [of Mines] is Mr. Anglade. And around that same time he talked about, not mining companies, but there was an issue where there was an underwater exploration in Ile-à-Vache, which is an island in Haiti, somehow there was a dispute between the company and the Bureau des Mines and what happened was, out of the blue, someone, somewhere decided to move the contract away from the Bureau des Mines and put it into the Minister of Culture."(Haiti's Riches:Interview with Ezili Dantò on Mining in Haiti; The secret behind the Rush to Haiti.)

What other waivers did Newmont, VCS Mining, et al... negotiate with the newly minted Washington government in Haiti? Perhaps a waiver of the 50%/50% sharing of profits or maybe no royalties to Haiti for 30-years? Ronald Baudin who helped Newmont and Majesco get to drill without a fully negotiated and signed convention with Haiti now works as a consultant for Newmont-Eurasian.

Tieramerica writes on Global Research:

Backroom deals, legally questionable “memorandums”, and test drilling carried out with no public scrutiny and little government oversight are all part of the new gold rush in Haiti.

Tieramerica quotes Dieuseul Anglade, a "well-respected geologist who headed the state mining agency for most of the past 20 years:"

 “Minerals are part of the public domain of the state,”.... if tougher laws and better contracts with the mining companies aren’t written, it would be better to “leave the minerals underground.”

Part 1  of Foreign Investment means Death and Repression: A Historical Perspective, explains:

"...Caracol job-for-Haiti (is) bait  to provide infrastructure and housing for the Denver-based miner Newmont (Eurasian/Marien Mining), Canada’s Majesco/VCS Mining and other foreign companies mining Haiti for gold, silver, copper, worth more than $20 billion dollars."

The New York Times focuses on the eviction of farmers for a factory complex just nine miles down the road from US mining operations worth $20 billion. What about the farmers evicted for Newmont and Majesco to mine for gold at the mining royalty rate on mineral resources is 2.5% to Haiti, which  is the lowest in Hemisphere. Will this help Haitians or just the foreigners?

People all over the world, where Newmont has  active mines, from Nevada, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, Ghana to Peru, are mad about Newmont and the gold mining industry. The Akyim indigenous community in Ghana has launched a world campaign to protest against Newmont. This week five protesters died in a clash in Peru over the Newmont mine. In the US, Newmont mining is accused of not paying Nevada taxes.

If the powerful Newmont conglomerate is not paying tax on mining profits in Nevada, USA, how reasonable is the expectation it shall pay the negotiated Haiti 50% profit tax or even the lowest 2.5% royalty rate in the Hemisphere to vulnerable Haiti?

Haiti is severely deforested, just suffered the worst earthquake damage in world history and its fragile water supply is ALREADY contaminated by foreign feces- UN-imported cholera from 2010.

What will leaking cyanide, arsenic emissions, mine waste, Marine ecosystem destruction and open pit mining and unsupervised drilling leave Haiti with up North?

The Times article doesn’t make the obvious correlation, nor mention the ecological concerns with the mining, just talks about Caracol Bay and Fort Liberte ecological concerns.

Most telling is how the Times article notably fails to mention, simply skips the obvious – Haiti’s vast (an Olympic pool to Venezuela’s glass of water) oil reserves in the North, its connection to the Caracol project."

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(For full report, go to Part I:  Foreign Investment means Death and Repression: A Historical Perspective)

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Forwarded by Ezili's Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network
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Washington Justice For Haiti:
In support of Paul Farmer’s pharmaceuticals and the Farmer groups – Brian Concannon/IDJH – asking the UN to judge itself guilty on behalf of Haiti cholera victims, Washington Post opines, justice for the Haiti cholera victims would be collectively awarding $40million to Paul Farmer pharmaceuticals for cholera vaccines - Ezili Dantò on Washington Post editorial supporting expansion of Farmer’s ineffective cholera vaccines

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Recorded in 2008 - interview with Ezili Dantò