WASHINGTON – Throughout final week’s White Home Africa Summit, Liberian President Joseph Boakai made a passionate request to US President Donald Trump for the US of America to assist Liberia conduct a survey of the nation’s minerals and pure sources. The request got here simply six months after President Boakai, whereas addressing Liberia’s fifty fifth Legislature in January, mentioned the nation had acquired a mineral useful resource survey report from the Chinese language authorities. The Chinese language survey uncovered a variety of mineral sources, and the Ministry of Mines and Power has since analyzed.
By Rodney D. Sieh, [email protected]
In an unique interview with FrontPageAfrica, following his assembly with President Trump on the White Home, President Boakai, when pressed as to why he had made the request when China had already carried out one, defined that the Chinese language survey didn’t cowl all the nation.
Mentioned the President: “China did two counties, Lofa and Maryland – and so they mentioned that we have now forty-seven minerals, very strategic. We wish to know, the minerals we have now in all the nation. It’s going to give us a greater alternative to plan for using our mineral and the administration of it. Actually, I’m feeling that it’s about time that we all know that in order that we plan which of them are extra strategic – and that we are able to handle them for the advantage of Liberians. The US has the abilities, and we imagine they too, as a result of as a substitute of simply sitting and complaining, we would like for them to be part of it. We don’t have the expertise they’ve. So, it is going to be useful for all of them to share this information and we are able to use it to our benefit.”
USGS 60’s period Survey Information outdated, Specialists Say
The seek for minerals has been a long-running difficulty for Liberia’s quest for pure sources discovery. Actually, within the Sixties, the US Geological Survey (USGS), in collaboration with the Liberian Geological Survey, performed intensive geological and geophysical mapping of Liberia. Nevertheless, many geological consultants and analysts now say, these knowledge are outdated.
The USGS survey, spanned from 1965 to 1972 and resulted within the publication of ten quadrangle folios, every protecting a particular space of Liberia. These maps, primarily based on subject knowledge, interpretations of gravity and magnetic surveys, and different geophysical knowledge, are helpful sources for understanding Liberia’s geological construction and sources.
In 2013, an identical venture specializing in the 2 counties, Lofa and Maryland talked about by President Boakai, was applied by the Wuhan Middle, China Geological Survey (Wuhan CGS), Institute of Geophysical and Geochemical Exploration of Chinese language Academy of Geological Sciences (IGGE), and China Academy of Aerospace Aerodynamics (CAAA). The survey venture started in 2013 when the settlement was formally sealed between each governments.
The Chinese language survey was seen as a possibility for progress and a big step to spice up Liberia’s mineral sector.
Liberia’s mineral trade, particularly iron ore, has lengthy performed an important position within the nation’s financial improvement. From the early Sixties till the civil disaster of the Nineteen Nineties, the iron ore mining sector contributed greater than 20 per cent of the gross nationwide product and employed greater than 50,000 individuals, or roughly 15 per cent of the nation’s whole workforce.
The artisanal mining of alluvial gold and diamonds has additionally made a modest contribution to the nationwide economic system over an extended interval.
A number of Mining Corporations in Liberia
Immediately, a number of worldwide corporations are working in Liberia’s mining area, with a deal with iron ore, gold, and diamonds. Main gamers embrace ArcelorMittal (iron ore) and Avesoro Sources (gold). Moreover, there are quite a few artisanal and small-scale mining operations all through the nation.
Main Mining Firms in Liberia: ArcelorMittal: A worldwide chief in iron ore manufacturing, ArcelorMittal has important operations in Liberia, significantly within the Nimba area; Avesoro Sources (previously Aureus Mining): Avesoro Sources, by way of its subsidiary Bea Mountain Mining Company, operates the New Liberty Gold Mine, Liberia’s first and largest business gold mine; Hummingbird Sources: Hummingbird Sources is concerned in gold exploration and feasibility assessments in Liberia; China Union has invested within the Bong Mines, specializing in iron ore extraction; MNG Gold Liberia (also referred to as MNG Gold): MNG Gold is concerned in gold exploration and mining actions and Western Cluster Restricted is concerned in iron ore mining.
For the Trump adminstration to realize critical curiosity in Liberia, an up to date geological survey could be key.
This was evident in June when President Trump oversaw a signed peace deal between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to finish combating in jap DRC. The extra urgent actuality was that the Trump administration has its sights set on securing profitable mineral rights within the two nations.
The deal additionally laid the framework for a future summit in Washington bringing collectively Trump, the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, and the DRC president, Félix Tshisekedi, with an eye fixed on the financial part, with the Trump administration wanting to revenue from ample mineral wealth in jap DRC. That settlement goals to draw western funding to the 2 nations’ mining sectors, which comprise deposits of tantalum, gold, cobalt, copper and lithium, whereas giving the US entry to vital minerals.
This is the reason many geological analysts say, an up to date geological survey of all the nation is essential. Nevertheless latest modifications in Washington and the Trump administration’s coverage shift towards the continent, emphasizing assist over commerce means that President Boakai’s request is unlikely to see gentle on the finish of the tunnel with out intense lobbying efforts in Washington.
Shifting US Coverage Complicates Survey Plea
The Trump administration has already slashed the U.S. Company for Worldwide Growth and slashed funding for packages that assist Africans. Nevertheless, in assembly with the leaders of the 5 African nations final week, the US President appeared to go away a window of alternative open. “We’re shifting from assist to commerce,” he mentioned initially of a White Home assembly. “There’s nice financial potential in Africa, like few different locations. In some ways, in the long term, this shall be far more practical and sustainable and useful than the rest that we might be doing collectively.”
Diplomatic observers say, African nations warming as much as Trump might should do extra to get his consideration and much more transactional enterprise to supply as Rwanda and Congo proved in latest days.
President Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema of Gabon was clear in his assembly with President Trump, that the continent is as much as the duty however wanted some push. “We aren’t poor nations. We’re wealthy nations relating to uncooked supplies. However we want companions to help us and assist us develop these sources,” he mentioned. “You might be welcome to return and make investments. In any other case, different nations may come as a substitute of you.”
The White Home summit marked a robust effort by not simply the Trump administration however these of his predecessors as properly, aiming to counter perceptions of U.S. neglect of a continent the place China has more and more made financial inroads.
The US too has its work minimize out, particularly with the large inroads being made by China. China, from earlier experiences, seem extra keen to bear the danger profile of doing enterprise on the continent, than the People are, in recent times.
This is the reason President Trump, in one among his first strikes after inauguration, put a pause on the Overseas Corrupt Practices Act, hoping to fulfill the Chinese language engagement strategies on stage phrases.
For the Trump administration, it comes with the danger of seeing the US flip a blind eye to once-core U.S. values like human rights and democracy.
Good Governance vs. Transactional Enterprise
The place the Trump administration might run into downside could also be on the controversy surrounding the problem of pressuring some African nations to just accept deportees from the US, a transfer that would, diplomatic observers say, put the US in an advanced dilemma with its business ambitions for the continent.
Much more sophisticated, the Trump administration’s latest determination to crackdown on unlawful immigration, together with a latest govt order concentrating on ten African nations, greater than another area, with a full or partial journey ban, ruffled just a few feathers on the continent.
The underside line for a lot of is that the US place set out by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in early July, when he said that the US was abandoning what he known as a charity-based overseas assist mannequin as opposed to working with nations that display ‘each the power and willingness to assist themselves’, might show pivotal in how President Trump reply to President Boakai’s request for a survey of Liberia’s minerals and pure sources.
Key shall be how the Trump administration views Liberia within the realm of its shifting transactional method to overseas coverage, particularly relating to Africa. With much less deal with good governance, human rights and establishment constructing, the Trump administration’s deal with a enterprise mannequin might be the deciding consider whether or not or not his administration responds favorable to Liberia’s pressing request for minerals survey.
