The Minister of Lands and Natural Resources has directed the Minerals Commission to dismiss DRA Ghana Limited, an agent of Newmont Ghana Gold Limited (NGGL), from undertaking any construction project management on any mining site in Ghana, among other recommendations.
An investigation into circumstances that led to NGGL Ahafo Mine’s accident, which resulted in multiple fatalities and various degrees of injury to four other workers, revealed that the company disregarded safety measures.
Consar is the contractor working under the supervision of DRA Ghana Limited, an engineering, procurement, construction and management agent of Newmont, constructing a reclaim tunnel as part of the Ahafo Mill Expansion Project.
The employees were reportedly involved in pouring a mixture of concrete at the reclaim tunnel when the two-level form work structure at the west end of the tunnel failed, killing six men and injuring four others.
The five-week long investigation by a team under the auspices of the Inspectorate Division of the Minerals Commission revealed design, operational and managerial failures on the part of both NGGL and its agents.
The team has thus made 32 recommendations including one to dismiss DRA Ghana Limited.
Most of the recommendations are punitive, regulatory and legal requirements. They include:
- Newmont Ghana Gold Limited Ahafo Mine shall suspend DRA Ghana Limited from all their activities at NGGL Ahafo Mines for failure to ensure the absolute health, safety and security of their contract employees and therefore breach of Regulation 533,LI 2182 of 2012.
- In the event of a major spill pf concrete mixture during pouring, Consar Limited shall ensure that the pouring of concrete into form works shall be halted, and a report should be made to the Project Manager for assessment and decision making.
- Provisions shall be made in all designs and construction of form works for diagonal or cross and horizontal bracings for all Projects on the Mine.
- Newmont shall review its emergency Response Plan to include construction related scenarios by May 30, 2018.
- Henceforth there shall be a counterpart Ghanaian Consulting Engineers and Architects for all Engineering, Procurement, Construction and Management activities at all mine sites in fulfillment of Local Content requirements.
Even though DRA submitted a petition in response to the investigation report in a bid to absolve itself, the sector minister, John-Peter Amewu, has “directed the Minerals Commission to implement to the letter all the recommendations made by the investigative team”.
Additionally, NGGL, DRA Ghana Limited and Consar have been fined to a tune of $ 2.7 million for their various contributions to the accident.
Source: 3news.com|Ghana
The post Newmont’s agent DRA Ghana Ltd sent packing over Ahafo fatal accident appeared first on 3newsgh.
Read Full Story
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Instagram
Google+
YouTube
LinkedIn
RSS