NOTHING HAS CHANGED SINCE 2017
ASSESSMENT OF CORRUPTION RISKS IN THE AWARDING OF MINING RIGHTS IN THE DRC PDF
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...ChAWegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw0kM-taVquP0amGjdMt-PT_
THE FOLLOWING REPORTS ARE FROM DRC NGO AND CIVIL SOCIETY GROUPS INCLUDING
GLOBAL WITNESS, ZOOM ECO.NET, AFRICA INTELLIGENCE, REUTERS,
COPPERBELT KATANGA MINING, 7SUR7.CD, ECONEWSRDC.COM, MINES.CD,
MAGAZINE LA GUARDIA, IWEBRDC, CONGO-NOUVEAU, ACTUALIT.CD IVYPANDA.COM
AFRICANEWS.COM, FRASERINSTITUTE.ORG, LESOIR.BE, REUTERS.COM, KONGO PRESS
14/12/2021
Investigation sounds alarm on risks in Congo’s nascent lithium sector
A new investigation by Global Witness looking into the Democratic Republic of Congo’s nascent lithium sector sounds the alarm bell on a swathe of potential supply chain risks.
MINING.COM Staff Writer | December 14, 2021 | 5:06 am
Battery Metals Africa Lithium
A report by Global Witness states that concessions on and around DRC’s lithium deposits are or were held by or involved people with close business relationships with former President Joseph Kabila.
www.mining.com
12/08/2022
The Episcopal Commission for Natural Resources of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CERN-CENCO) organized, this Thursday, August 11, 2022, a conference under the theme: "How can lithium from Manono in the DRC contribute to the energy transition? Multi-stakeholder reflection on the sidelines of the pre-COP27”.
Initiated under the cover of the Ecclesial Network of the Congo Basin Forest (REBAC), this conference brought together several stakeholders, including partner companies such as COMINIERE, AVZ and other shareholders.
zoom-eco.net
05/09/2022
DRC UNITED STATES
US disillusioned over failure to turn DR Congo away from Beijing. Ever since Félix Tshisekedi took power, Washington had hoped he would curb China's huge influence in the country. Four years later, the United States is bitterly disappointed that it has failed to break Beijing's hegemony in strategic mining issues.
www.africaintelligence.com
09/10/2022
Financial crime watchdog adds Congo to money laundering watch list
KINSHASA, Oct 8 The Financial Action Task Force plans to put Democratic Republic of Congo on a list of countries subject to increased monitoring. Congo, a major cobalt and copper producer, will go on the global financial crime watchdog's so-called "grey list" of deficient countries no later than Oct. 21 for shortcomings in stamping out financial corruption, including money laundering and anti-terrorist financing.
The Financial Action Task Force plans to put Democratic Republic of Congo on a list of countries subject to increased monitoring, the country's Communications Minister Patrick Muyaya said on Saturday.
www.reuters.com
29/10/2022
DRC: UC SAS denounces a mining fraud of more than USD 10 million estimated at 60 tons of Coltan and Cassiterite, perpetrated in Manono and Malemba-Nkulu
A mining fraud of more than 60 tons of coltan and cassiterite, valued at more than USD 10 million, is allegedly perpetrated in the territories of Manono and Malemba-Nkulu, in the provinces of Haut Lomami and Tanganyika. This company accuses a certain Hadley Nathus and a Canadian subject named Eric Allard (chairman and CEO of the company TANTALEX) who, acting in complicity with the leaders of COMINIERE, would be in collusion with some authorities of the country, to cover up this large-scale mining fraud. UC SAS alerts the authorities to monitor this situation.
In addition, this company accuses by name the Ministry of Justice of having taken a decision contrary to the rule of law by instructing the Single Window for Business Creation (GUCE), through its letter number 2160/LW10130/APP/CAB/ME/MIN/J&GS/2022 of September 20, 2022, technical service under its supervision, to cancel a legal transfer of shares for the benefit of a Canadian subject "yet condemned on Congolese soil by judgments that have become final". The company UC SAS notes that the instruction of the Ministry of Justice given to the GUCE "violates the laws of the country and proceeds from an abuse of power, insofar as it operates on the judgments that have become final about this assignment: RP19203, RCE 7495, RPO 10247/10267, as well as a pre-law under RAC 2942". In addition, it deplores the "sabotage" of the efforts made by the President of the Republic Felix Tshisekedi, to establish good governance in the DRC, marked by, among other things, respect for the principle of separation of powers and the improvement of the business climate. "The DRC must avoid being influenced by crooked individuals, so-called investors, while recognized speculators, at the risk of tarnishing the image of the entire country, and particularly the Sama Lukonde government...", deplores the UC SAS in its statement.
https://copperbeltkatangamining.com...ing_wp_cron=1681782116.9836490154266357421875
20/11/2022
DRC - Mines: COMINIERE SA accused of blocking the Manono Lithium production project, this mineral prized in the manufacture of electric batteries (Civil Society)
The Congolese state portfolio company COMINIERE SA is accused of continuing to multiply illegal manoeuvres to block the effective start-up of Dathcom's lithium mining project in Manono, Tanganyika province.
President Tshisekedi called to ensure the integrity of the leaders of the COMINIERE
Based on this observation, civil society asks President Félix-Antoine Tshisekedi to ensure that the climate of trust reigns between the shareholders of the joint venture Dathcom Mining SA so that operating operations begin urgently and to give orders to the state services for Dathcom Mining SA to be notified and that the 10% of action of the State are effectively registered in the register of the Mining Cadastre, in accordance with mining legislation.
Leaders of the COMINIERE called to resign
Finally, the leaders of COMINIERE SA are called upon to resign taking into account the conclusions of the General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) on their management and the sale of the assets of this state enterprise. The organizations and platforms of civil society in the DRC that signed this press release are: CDH, ESPOIR ONGDH, JUSTICIA Asbl, LICOCO, MAX IMPACT, MDR, POM, RCEN, RDN Asbl, CERN/CENCO AND TPRDC.
7sur7.cd
20/11/2022
Civil Society points to the culprit and mobilizes to save the Manono lithium mining project
The lithium mining project in Manono, in the province of Tanganyika, is stalling. And civil society, evolving in the natural resources sector, does not hesitate to name the culprit: Cominière (Congolese mining company), this company of the State Portfolio born from the vestiges of Zaire-Etain. In a statement, made simultaneously, on November 20, 2022, in Kinshasa, Kolwezi, Lubumbashi and Bukavu, these Civil Society Organizations note that "the management of Cominière SA must stop blocking Manono's development and undermining the presidential energy policy and the development of 145 territories by multiplying strategies to block Dathcom Mining". From the outset, these Civil Society Organizations specialized in natural resources issues say they note "agitation and maneuvers on the part of certain administrative and judicial government services as well as Cominière SA in order to freeze the notification of the Operating Permit of Dathcom Mining SA and communicate to it the total amount of surface rights due to the State.
Faustin KUEDIASALA 0
econewsrdc.com
21/11/2022
DRC: La Cominière in the sights of the 12 NGOs
A dozen national organizations accuse the public company
Cominière S A of blocking the Manono Lithium project. Indeed, to start the exploitation of this strategic ore, there is a prerequisite, it is access to electrical energy
magazinelaguardia.info
28/11/2022
DRC: this is why civil society organizations specializing in mining issues are asking Tshisekedi to dismiss the portfolio minister
In a joint press release, Congolese civil society organizations and platforms specializing in mining issues (Justicia Asbl, LICOCO, RND Asbl, POM, MDR, GANVE, CDH, ESPOIR ONG, RCEN, CERN / CENCO, TPRDC, MAX IMPACT) , who have been monitoring the exploitation of natural resources in the Democratic Republic of Congo, ask the President of the Republic to dismiss the Minister of Portfolio of the Government of the Republic By Gilbert Ngonga
iwebrdc.com
30/11/2022
mines.cd
19/12/2022
Sale of the mining assets of Cominière SA: Technical director Célestin Kibeya accused of complicity and usurpation of competence
Congolese civil society organizations and platforms specializing in mining issues (Justicia Asbl, LICOCO, RND Asbl, POM, MDR, GANVE, CDH, ESPOIR ONG, RCEN, CERN/CENCO, TPRDC, MAX IMPACT), monitoring exploitation of natural resources in the Democratic Republic of Congo, accused, in a press release, the technical director Célestin Kibeya Kabemba of being no stranger to the selling off of the mining assets of the Congolese mining company (Cominière SA). Worse still, the man exercises the functions of interim Director General without presidential order, nor decree of the ministry of supervision, that of the Portfolio, even less a report of the Board of directors. "Already on October 26, 2022, when the interim Managing Director Mwamba Athanase was not yet in the hands of Congolese justice, the same Mr. Kibeya had co-signed as '' Managing Director ai '' on behalf of Cominière SA a press release press attributed to UNITED COMINIERE SAS with Eric Allard, a convicted person in Lubumbashi for forgery and use of forgery, and Michel Kitwa Nelkin. “, denounce these NGOs.
congo-nouveau.info
11/04/2023
DRC: CNPAV asks Felix Tshisekedi to reconsider his letter to Joe Biden requesting the lifting of sanctions against Dan Gertler
The Congo is not for sale (CNPAV) sends a letter to the President of the Democratic Republic of Congo Félix Tshisekedi to express his "deepest dismay" following the discovery, in the columns of the New York Times newspaper, of his letter dated of May 05, 2022 addressed to his American counterpart Joe Biden, requesting the lifting of sanctions against Dan Gertler. According to CNPAV estimates, the losses for the Congo in cases linked to Dan Gertler amount to more than $2 billion.
actualite.cd
15/04/2023
Corruption in Infrastructure of the Democratic Republic of Congo Research Paper
While the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) emerges from a long period of violence and instability, it also faces a legacy of deep-rooted bribery at all levels of society, threatening social and political institutions with failure. DRC has suffered from modest bribes to high fraud through shady financial dealings. As a result, corruption exists in various sectors, including the police, legal system, public administration, and mining or extractive industry, despite the country’s anti-corruption initiatives.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) corruption exists in various sectors, including the police, legal system, public administration, and mining industry.
ivypanda.com
28/04/2023
Financial Patrol: The IGF flushes out an industrial quantity of duplicates, forgers and cheats among civil servants and agents of the State!
According to the IGF, 145,604 paid agents have incorrect, fanciful and fabricated registration numbers for payroll purposes; 53,328 agents alone have more than one registration number in the file with the same name; 93,356 agents share the same registration number with other equally paid agents; 43,725 agents are paid without their names appearing on the declarative lists from their original departments; while 961 payroll officers are on the payrolls of several departments and many of them are on more than 15 payrolls.
The IGF informs that already, certain cases of obvious irregularities are the subject of deactivation and warns at the same time that the list of 961 agents responsible for processing the payroll involved in the mafia network will be transmitted to the judicial authorities for embezzlement of public funds. It should be remembered that the control of the number of civil servants and agents of the State remains a cancer that has seriously eaten away at the public treasury for decades. Despite all the efforts made by successive Ministers of Public Service, the problem remains very deep.
scooprdc.net
28/04/2023
The Democratic Republic of Congo's Inspectorate General of Finance (IGF) has revealed massive fraud in the public payroll department, where dozens of fictitious employees cost the state nearly $800 million a year.
According to the findings of an audit of the government's payroll, the IGF noted numerous irregularities, with tens of thousands of fictitious employees. Each month, "the monthly loss of earnings suffered by the Treasury is 148,999,749,440.95 Congolese francs (or 66.2 million dollars)," said the IGF in a statement dated Thursday, concerning the audit conducted by its services. The Congolese public finance watchdog says that more than 145,000 paid agents have "incorrect, fictitious and fabricated registration numbers for payroll purposes". Also, more than 40,000 agents are paid without their names appearing on the declaratory lists from the services that employ them, while more than 90,000 agents "share the same registration number with other agents who are also paid.
https://twitter.com/africanews
According to the findings of an audit of the government's payroll, the IGF noted numerous irregularities, with tens of thousands of fictitious employees.
www.africanews.com
04/05/2023
Mining attractiveness: the DRC ranked 82 out of 83 countries in the Fraser Institute report
The latest Fraser Institute annual report ranks the DRC at the bottom of the world ranking of the least attractive states for investment in the mining sector. Out of a total of 83 countries studied, the DRC ranks 82nd in the mining policy index. It is Venezuela that closes the world ranking, thus being the only country listed behind the DRC. According to the Fraser Institute 2022 Report, the investment climate in the mining sector in the DRC is simply unattractive. Following a field visit between August 23 and December 30, 2022, their experts interviewed 1,966 exploration, development and other mining-related companies. They ended up with this very negative rating due to several destabilizing factors, mainly the unilateral increase in the royalty rate, the lack of clarity on the limits of mining exploration concessions and cases of corruption.
https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/annual-survey-of-mining-companies-2022.pdf
12/05/2023
Fraud and corruption in the DRC: damning revelations from the head of the General Inspectorate of Finance
I would pinpoint five, related to corruption and the embezzlement of public funds. The control of the Central Bank of Congo is the first: we discovered credit cards held by civil servants, politicians. Directly connected to the general account of the Treasury via commercial banks, these cards could be used at any time. The State account could thus be debited for extremely high amounts, amounting to 10,000 dollars per day and purchases could reach the same amount. The Congolese Treasury has thus lost a lot of money.
The audit of the mining sector was the third important case: the examination of all the contracts concluded between 2010 and 2020 by Gécamines (the General Society of Quarries and Mines) revealed serious facts of the selling off of mining assets. Between 2010 and 2020, Gécamines made nearly $2 billion in profits and 97% of that amount was squandered on operating expenses and snacks. In addition, nearly 612 million dollars, paid by Gécamines to the Congolese State in respect of taxes due in 2010 and 2019 and paid into the Treasury account, have disappeared at the level of the Central Bank of Congo.... The affair of Chinese contracts, opaque and unbalanced, is resounding…
16/05/2023
World Bank suspends $1 billion worth of project funding in Congo
KINSHASA, May 16 (Reuters) - The World Bank has suspended funding for humanitarian and development projects in Democratic Republic of Congo worth more than $1 billion after the government dissolved the project fund without warning, the lender said.
The letter also said that the bank was still waiting for documentation on the status of $91 million which had already been advanced for the projects out of the total $1.04 billion.
Four of Congo's main opposition politicians wrote to the leaders of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the African Development Bank last week asking them to conduct an audit of their funds in Congo, saying they suspected misuse.
www.reuters.com
07/06/2023
The National Business Climate Barometer (BNCA) survey, covering four hundred and three companies in thirteen sectors of the national economy, gave the Democratic Republic of Congo a satisfaction rate of 37% in this sector.
At this stage, the BNCA gives a satisfaction score of 37%. This survey, which took place from January 24 to March 27, 2023, involved 403 companies in 13 sectors of the national economy
"Indeed, whether it is the quality of relations between the public administration and economic operators, corruption and security disturbances, infrastructure, legal and judicial security, the tax and parafiscal system, access to financing for companies,... they have exposed the scourges that plague and gnaw at our economic environment," added Mr. Tshisekedi.
This summary report presenting the opinions of business leaders on the changing business climate, while highlighting the factors that have most influenced the business environment
The National Business Climate Barometer (BNCA) in the DRC was launched on February 15, 2023 by the Business Climate Cell, a structure of the Presidency. It is a tool for promoting public-private partnership that is used to periodically assess the degree of satisfaction of economic operators with the reforms and other practices related to the business environment in the DRC.
11/06/2023
DRC excluded from the list of investments of the French group ERAMET, following the blocking of the PE of lithium of Manono by the government
It was last March that the DR Congo and the EU announced an agreement on rare minerals such as copper, cobalt and lithium, the two parties initiated negotiations for a partnership on the exploitation of rare minerals and strategic, for the next few months a "win-win" memorandum of understanding and a roadmap are announced on this cooperation and investment agreement in a mining sector in the DRC, so the EU intends to fight the Chinese monopoly in the DRC , reduce its dependence on China and accelerate its ecological transition.
The EU is focusing above all on the development of a value chain in the DR Congo and the creation of a market for the battery, electric vehicle and renewable energy industry, as pointed out by Mrs. Jutta Urpilainen, European Commissioner for
International Partnerships :
“We want to create value in the DRC, local added value. Not just exporting your raw materials to Finland, Europe and then refining them in Europe. We do n't want to create dependency, nor do we want neocolonialism. We really want to create local value and we want to create a win-win partnership. »
During the visit of President
Emmanuel Macron to Kinshasa, the two countries notably concluded an agreement for the mapping and sustainable management of the mining resources which abound in the Congolese subsoil, French companies and institutes will be invited to map and invest in the mining sector of the DR Congo according to this partnership. But here is following the blocking of the delivery of the exploitation permit 13359 by the Congolese government to DATHCOM, of which the group AVZ MINERALS owns 75%, which must allow the start of the exploitation of the lithium of Manono, the French group, ERAMET has just excluded the DR Congo from its investment strategy in Africa for the time being.
“
Geoff Streeton , director of strategy for the company, and
Christophe Thillier , in charge of exploration, have also drawn a line under the DRC for the moment, despite having identified its lithium potential.
The difficulties encountered by the Australian
AVZ MINERALS on its Manono project in Tanganyika in the south-east of the country gave the French company some food for thought, which has chosen to focus its investments in this sector on its Centenario-Ratones project in Argentina," said the media, Africa Intelligence. ERAMET is a French mining and metallurgical company with a workforce of 9,090 employees spread over 17 mining and industrial sites in 15 countries. In 2022, it achieved a turnover of 5.014 billion euros. On November 8, 2021, ERAMET announced the launch of its lithium mine project in the Andean highlands of northern Argentina. The construction of a plant will start in early 2022 and end in 2024 with the aim of producing 24,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate per year. Much of its lithium production will supply the European battery construction sector.
June 11, 2023Kiki Kienge
kongopress.com
thestockexchange.com.au
