By Dennis Peprah
Sunyani, Aug. 31, GNA – Mr David Ebo Johnson, Director, Communications and External Relations, Newmont Ahafo South Mine in the Asutifi North District of Ahafo Region, has expressed appreciation to stakeholders for their support in managing speculative developments around the Ahafo North Project.
He expressed worry that the development of the Ahafo North project in the Tano North Municipality was stopped for sometime due to widespread speculative activities that impacted negatively on the entire project.
However, Mr Johnson added, that with the support from stakeholders, the company was able to manage those speculative activities, considerably.
“Speculative developments have been a huge challenge for us. The project had to be paused for a while to deal with these challenges”, he told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview in Sunyani on the side-lines of a media training workshop organised by Newmont to update Journalists on the progress of the Ahafo North project.
“Once you stop a project, it actually increases the project and also extends the time that commercial production would begin. So, speculative structures had a huge negative impact on the project, thankfully with the support of stakeholders we have been able to manage that considerably. ”
“And so, we don’t anticipate that we have any more stoppages as a result of that,” Mr Johnson explained, saying, the company anticipated that commercial production at the Ahafo North project would commence in the second half of 2025.
“However, as we get closer to the time, we would be able to give more definitive timelines”, he added.
On managing job expectations around the project, Mr Johnson said, “we trained the locals for the industry and beyond, and with that kind of training one could find a job either with the company directly, or through the contractors, or even with other mining companies.”.m
Touching on resettlement of affected communities, the Communications and External Relations Director explained that happened at the Resettlement Negotiation Committee level which had sufficient representation from the communities and led by a professional valuer.
“So, through these processes we ensure that the community doesn’t get short-changed in that whole resettlement discussion.
But, I think it’s just important to highlight that it’s a process, very well documented, and so some of these things take time, but we are making sure that we are engaging in a process that stands the test of time in terms of best practices”, Mr Johnson stated.
“In fact, we have learnt great lessons from the past and we expect the Ahafo North project will create more jobs, and thereby, enhance the socio-economic livelihoods of the locals”, he added.
GNA