The
Barrick Files 6
Tanzanian Activists Charged with Sedition for Criticizing World Bank
Project
Please take the time to respond to the following urgent action alert, and to circulate it among your networks. Apologies for cross postings. Below the Alert you will find a newspaper article with more information. Please distribute this broadly.
Tanzanian Environmental Activists Persecuted for Speaking Out Against World Bank Group Gold Mine!!!
The
Tanzanian government has charged two environmental activists and an opposition
political leader with sedition for speaking out about allegations of widespread
human rights abuses at a World Bank Group guaranteed gold mine. We are sending
out this message because these activists need your help! Please take 15 minutes
to send a short fax to World Bank Group President James Wolfensohn (as
described below).
Rugemeleza
Nshala and Tundu Lissu of the Lawyers' Environmental Action Team (LEAT) and
Augustine Mrema, Chairman of the Tanzanian Labor Party have been raising
concerns over allegations of killings, illegal evictions and destruction of
livelihoods at the Bulyanhulu Gold Mine in August 1996. According to the
evidence they have compiled, tens of
thousands
of artisanal miners and their families were evicted with little notice, and as
many as 52 miners may have been buried in mining pits, when the Government of
Tanzania and Sutton Resources, a Canadian mining company, took control of the
mine site.
The World
Bank Group's insurance arm, the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency
(MIGA), is supporting the project with an enormous amount of political risk
insurance. MIGA has rejected calls for an independent inquiry into the
circumstances surrounding the 1996 evictions.
For their
efforts to publicize these allegations, Mr. Nshala, Mr. Lissu, and Mr. Mrema
have been accused of making statements which "bring into contempt or to
excite disaffection against the lawful authority" of the Government of
Tanzania. Mr. Nshala and Mr. Lissu are appealing for help from individuals and
organizations around the world. Specifically, they have requested that people
send a fax to World Bank Group President James Wolfensohn, and insist that he:
Send the
fax to: James Wolfensohn, President, World Bank Group
FAX NUMBER:
+1-202-522.7700
Please
don't forget to ALSO send us a copy of the fax: Steve Herz
FAX NUMBER:
+1-202-783.0444
Or, if you
cannot send a fax, please send an email letter to President Wolfensohn by
clicking on:
http://www.actglobal.org/campaigns/Tanzanian_goldmine
For more
information on the controversy surrounding the Bulyanhulu Gold Mine see the http://www.leat.or.tz/active/buly
(LEAT Files
MIGA Complaint Over Alleged Bulyanhulu Human Rights Violations)
Please
don't hesitate to contact us if you have questions or are willing to take
additional action:
Tundu
Lissu, Lawyer's Environmental Action Team (LEAT), Tanzania, E-mail: lissu@wri.org
or
Steve Herz,
Friends of the Earth USA, E-mail: sherz@foe.org
DAR ES SALAAM, 3 May 2002 (IRIN)
The leader of
an opposition party and two environmental lawyers were this week charged with
sedition over their persistent claims that at least 50 artisanal miners were
buried alive at Bulyanhulu, Tanzania's biggest gold mine, in 1996. Claims that
small-scale miners were buried alive initially emerged soon after Bulyanhulu
mining areas were cleared for the development of large-scale production when
the mine was taken over by foreign investors in 1996. The Tanzanian government
and Barrick Gold, the Canadian company that owns the mine, have repeatedly
denied the claims.
Augustine
Mrema, leader of the Tanzania Labour Party (TLP), and Rugumeleza Nshala and
Tundu Lissu of the Lawyers Environmental Action Team (LEAT) were charged with
sedition for allegedly having published material and made speeches encouraging
disaffection against the government.
Mrema told
IRIN on Thursday that the police had charged him with writing a letter or
giving a press statement in which he was alleged to have said that at least 52
people were buried alive in the Bulyanhulu mine, and that the government had
not taken any steps to investigate the matter.
He said
that, as he did not know what material the police were referring to, he had
denied the charges and was waiting to see what was levelled against him. Mrema
insisted that he did not intend to incite people against the Tanzanian
government.
Nshala
confirmed that he and Lissu had been held in connection with a statement last
year claiming that the mining company, aided by the police, had filled in
artisanal mining pits in 1996 "while knowing that there were people inside
those pits".
"I am
just waiting for the charges to be formally levelled against me and then I will
explain myself," Nshala told IRIN. "Basically it is a campaign to try
and silence us, but we think that the facts will come through in the
case."
The trial
is scheduled to begin on 31 May 2002. If convicted, the three accused face up
to two years in prison and a fine of 10,000 Tanzanian shillings (about US $10).
The TLP and LEAT have been conducting independent inquiries into the Bulyanhulu
allegations, and claim to have proof that artisanal miners were buried alive
when the mine was being developed in 1996.
Vince Borg,
head of Corporate Communications at Barrick Gold Corporation, told IRIN in
March that those people who claimed to have evidence supporting the allegations
of killings at Bulyanhulu should present it to the proper authorities.
One of
Tanzania's most respected legal figures, Judge Mark Bomani, called in the same
month for an independent commission into the alleged killings in 1996. Bomani,
a former attorney-general, said that only an independent commission could
impartially establish the truth over claims that have sporadically emerged in
the press over the last five years.
(May
2002)