…wear face masks in silent protest

STAFFERS of the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) have promised to stay away from work as long as mercury-laced gold continues to be burnt in the compound.

The GGMC staffers who wore face masks “in silent protest,” downed tools and walked off the job on Friday as they expressed dissatisfaction over the handling of the mercury issue facing the commission.

Groups of staff members who assembled in the yard to leave the GGMC compound told the Guyana Chronicle that they were no longer performing their duties after senior managers refused to continue working in the compound. They said this, as well as the recent death of another colleague and the continued burning of gold in the GGMC compound has forced workers to react.

“After we heard of the death of the guy yesterday [Thursday], we decided not to protest because even if you are given sick leave, the point is you remain sick. But the managers, they had a meeting this morning [Friday] and they unequivocally decided that they were not going to take this anymore and we decided to take the same position. We decided to wear the masks as a silent protest,” a senior staff told this newspaper.

The GGMC staff said that among the issues affecting them is that more persons are proving to be seriously affected by the mercury contamination, and are being sent on sick leave, but the Guyana Gold Board continues to burn gold in the compound. They said another GGMC staff member has passed away and although it is unknown whether his death was directly related to mercury, very little is being done to allay workers’ fears.

They continued to complain about being unable to access their building which formerly housed the Ministry of Natural Resources(MoNR). They said that the MoNR staffers started to remove from the building, but continue to store paperwork in locked rooms which they believe GGMC staffers could be using. They said the ministry is telling the GGMC that the paper cannot be removed because they have to be seen by the Finance Ministry.

The GGMC staff said that apart from staffers who are already at home, 70 more persons are expected to be sent on sick leave.  This they say, will add to the already low staff count at the Brickdam office, given the number of workers on sick leave and out in the field.

Staffers warned that the ministry and other relevant authorities should ensure the mercury issue does not escalate, pointing to a day care and residential homes on Hadfield Street that are in the wind path of emissions. The GGMC staffer said they have also formed an internal union to represent themselves after they would have severed ties with the Guyana Public Service Union, who they maintain are unable to truly represent the concerns of the staff.

When the Guyana Chronicle visited the GGMC, large groups of masked workers were leaving the compound. By mid-morning security personnel at the commission’s entrance were turning away the public and informing them that the agency was closed and no business was being conducted for the day. GGMC’s Commissioner Newell Dennison said he was not in a position to offer a comment on the workers’ walk-out when one was sought.

Last week it was disclosed that an Air Quality Monitoring study conducted by Kaizen Environmental Services (Guyana) Limited has found that the Mercury (Hg) levels within the compound of the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC), which also houses the Guyana Gold Board and its lab, is in keeping with the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (US OHSA) standards.

Despite the results however, Natural Resources Minister Raphael Trotman has recommended that an “expert review” of the Gold Board’s laboratory be conducted, in the light of additional findings that from a total of 130 GGMC staff tested, 60 persons had higher than the normal level of mercury. The board has been set up.

Kaizen Environmental Services (Guyana) – a subsidiary of Kaizen Environmental Services Trinidad Limited — conducted the Air Quality Monitoring tests at the Gold Board’s laboratory and its environs at the GGMC compound, Brickdam, on March 28, 2018. According to the report which was compiled by Kaizen and released by the Natural Resources Ministry last Friday, 10 locations within the compound were monitored and were found to be within the norm.

“The Mercury (Hg) levels monitored at all ten (10) locations were within the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (US OSHA) eight-hour Permissible Exposure Limit (PEL),” the Kaizen report concluded.

Notably, the waiting area, laboratory, smelting room, burning room, mercury abatement site, GGMC parking lot, GGMC HR Department, the main security hut, GGMC Hadfield Street Security Hut and Conway’s Enterprise, Hadfield Street, were the areas covered during the monitoring exercise conducted by Kaizen.

The report was released hours after the Guyana Gold Board held a joint press conference with the Ministry of Natural Resources at Duke Lodge in Kingston to discuss the concern that GGMC and Gold Board staff may be exposed to high levels of mercury. From the outset of the press conference, Minister Trotman; the Guyana Gold Board Chairman Gabriel Lall; and the General Manager of the Guyana Gold Board, Eondrene Thompson, stated that the health and safety of persons utilising the compound, primarily the workers, are of paramount importance.

“It is a priority and our actions have been geared towards addressing the situation toward resolving the situation satisfactorily,” Lall told a corps of reporters. He said it was on that basis that the Gold Board contracted the services of the Trinidad company to carry out an independent exercise to determine the air quality within the compound of GGMC, where the lab is being housed.