‘Massive illegal Chinese goldmining uncovered in Eastern Sierra Leone’ 20 June 2021

Hot on the heels of the corrupt $55m Chinese fishmeal factory deal at Black Johnson in Freetown, Western Sierra Leone, as well as the attempted impalement of a Sierra Leonean worker by a Chinese manager at the Tonkolili mine in Northern Sierra Leone, we have uncovered massive, industrial-scale illegal Chinese goldmines in Eastern Sierra Leone. The illegal Chinese goldmines are located in Penguia Chiefdom, in the far corner of Kailahun District, Eastern Sierra Leone, which the government of Sierra Leone has kept secret for the past three years…The contact we had stopped to rendezvous with told us, ‘These are the guys who are mining gold and carrying out illegal logging in Penguia. We are frequently woken up by large mining excavators, low loaders carrying diggers, and trucks full of equipment.’

…On a bright March morning, the people of Manowa town woke to find a low loader stuck in their town as it tried to negotiate its way on a diverted road after one of the illegal goldminers’ heavy excavators had broken a concrete bridge over a small river called Manee, in Manowa. Oops! This was not supposed to have happened; the low loader was a night traveller that ought not to have been seen by the people. It suddenly became a spectacle for the locals, who came in good numbers to look at the equipment. Penguia Chiefdom has been ravaged by illegal Chinese mining and logging since the new administration came to power three years ago. The chiefdom, one of the poorest in Sierra Leone, has had its lettered Paramount Chief, PC Samuel Gibrilla, expelled. A seven-man committee of men, who can’t read or write, has been put in place to ‘manage’ the Chiefdom’s affairs.

…The river that runs through the villages is contaminated with chemicals and heavy metals. This satellite image shows a polluted river snaking its way through the forests and into towns and villages. Community people have started reporting ‘new’ illnesses in women and children and in the men who work in the mines. But not even the chiefs are able to tell you what is happening here – the illegal Chinese goldminers wield so much power and influence at state level that they trample upon whatever local authority is in place. Workers here are in slave labour, and they are largely sedated with alcohol (Pega Pack, as they call it) and drugs to enhance labour output and weaken any discontent…. Sierra Leone’s sickness is a combination of wretched deficiency in leadership, repulsive corruption and outright disregard for the rights and liberties of its citizens, who are sold out for personal gains. This small but resource-endowed country is being systemically decimated by greed.