Luapula Province Minister Derrick Chilundika has called for the enforcement of the Law in dealing with illegal mining activities in Chifunabuli District.
Mr Chilundika however, said the law should be applied so as not to injure the people whose only source of income could be in Mining.
The Minister advised that people need to follow the Law and conduct mining in a legal manner if the province is to benefit the mining sector.
“Government will not allow illegal mining, we need to apply the law and ensure that people especially locals register mines, because government wants to empower locals in different businesses including in mining, however, in doing so we should not injure our people, we should apply the law consciously,” the Minister said.
Mr Chilundika was responding to a concerns raised by Chifunabuli District Commissioner Adam Banda when he paid a courtesy call on him.
He emphasised that government wants local people to benefit from the natural resources in the country and thus encouraged local miners to legalize their activities.
“Government will not allow illegal mining, but even as government wants to legalise mining, we should ensure that we don’t injure our people who may only be depending on mining for their living, let us bring them together and encourage them to register their mines, by doing so we will be empowering the people and government will in turn benefit through revenue collections,” he said
The Minister has since called on licensed mining companies that are mining in the district to consider locals in their operations.
Earlier Chifunabuli District Commissioner Adam Banda told the Minister that the District is concerned with the increase in illegal mining activities in the district.
While in the district the Minister has also met Ward Development Committee Members for Chifunabuli Constituency to share on issues to do with the Implementation of the Constituency Development Fund
Those licenses only cost money for those miners, who are all poor people. These licenses don’t bring anything in return, the authorities just pocket the money. Look at the chaos that happened at Black Mountain: the authorities, including Paul Kabuswe himself, didn’t do anything to regulate the situation. Yesterday one person even died. “Follow the law” the guy says. What law? The law to pay money for a useless piece of paper?