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Manganese company sifting gold non-stop at Matthews Ridge – Glenn Lall
…says no Guyanese allowed to work near GMI’s Matthews Ridge site
Manganese mining at Matthews Ridge, North West District
Kaieteur News – Noting that Guyanese are not allowed to work near the mills, publisher of the Kaieteur News, Mr. Glenn Lall in a bombshell revelation on Friday, said that the Guyana Manganese Inc. (GMI) company at Matthews Ridge is sifting the two minerals “non-stop” at the North West District mining operation.
Publisher of Kaieteur News, Glen Lall
“The so-called manganese plant sifting manganese and gold non-stop in Matthews Ridge and not a single Guyanese is allowed to work near the mills separating the gold from the manganese,” Lall said.
Lall made the revelation on his show which is aired on Kaieteur Radio every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 19:20 hrs and rebroadcasted on other days.
The publisher noted that in the year 2022, Guyana collected around US $5M in earnings from manganese, when over $1B left the country’s shores. The company, a subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned Bosai Minerals Group, obtained the rights to operate at Matthews Ridge in 2016.
Lall said the company has a fleet of 40-60 tonne trucks driven by Guyanese. The trucks transport the manganese to Port Kaituma from its operations base. However, he said locals aren’t involved in the operation beyond this point.
“The loading of the manganese on the barges and on the ship, is strictly done by the Chinese. Guyanese don’t get to see what or how much is being loaded on those barges or ships on a daily basis. What is the reason for that?” Lall questioned.
He went on to say that Guyana is giving away raw manganese in billions of US dollars while on the other hand, the country imports the finished products by the hundreds of millions of US dollars to purify the country’s water supply at the Guyana Water Inc (GWI).
“I was also informed that these ships when they leave Port Kaituma, uncle they do not go out and offload immediately into the big ship waiting outside in the Atlantic Ocean. It goes first to Linden at the bauxite company to pick up bauxite. Then head out to offload in the big ship in the Atlantic Ocean,” Lall noted.
He further explained that at Port Kaituma, the ships are not filled to the brim, noting that only three quarters with manganese are loaded there. The ships then head to Linden where a small quantity of bauxite is spread on top to cover the manganese. When declared with customs, the consignment does not leave Guyana as the expensive manganese metal, but rather, as the cheaper mineral, bauxite.
Lall reiterated that in order to cover up the scam, no Guyanese national is allowed to work near the ships at Port Kaituma. But that’s not all, he added. He said that some years ago Chinese nationals entered Guyana illegally to test the ground at Matthews Ridge to detect what minerals they could find to exploit.
Upon their discovery of the exact mineral they were after, which is gold, the Chinese company informed the government that they were going to conduct manganese operations in Guyana.
“Them people land on a gold mine in Matthews Ridge, wuh become a gold galore, uncle day and night, is not enough for them people to wuk, them ain’t only install one grinding mill, them install three mills that separates the gold from the manganese., ” Lall said.
He reiterated that the “so-called manganese plant” is a dual-purpose venture, sifting gold and manganese non-stop and Guyanese aren’t allowed to work near the site.
He illustrated the operations on his show with photographs, which indicated the processing tray of the minerals and it was clear that the ratio of raw gold greatly outweighed that of the manganese.
GMI is not registered to mine gold. The company never declared “a single pennyweight” of gold to the Guyana Gold Board. Lall added that he is in possession of video evidence which shows the magnitude of the gold operations to substantiate his claims.
In August 2021, Kaieteur News reported that with the Guyana’s growing extractive sectors being key to the nation’s development, communities like Matthews Ridge, highlight the need for a more robust engagement on the part of the government when monitoring the activities of companies like GMI and enforcing laws, which are supposed to protect citizens, their livelihoods, and environment.
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