* Protests to be held by communities affected by British miner Vedanta Resources in India and Africa.
* Activist shareholders to again disrupt London AGM on 14th August.
* Vedanta battles international arbitration and UK compensation case over Zambian pollution.
Foil Vedanta
Loud and theatrical protests will again be held outside the AGM of British mining company Vedanta Resources'(1) AGM at the Lincoln Centre, Lincoln Inn Fields, London at 2pm on Monday 14th August(2) accusing the company of major environmental and human rights abuses across its operations. Parallel protests will be held by affected communities and their supporters at several locations in India and Zambia. Inside the AGM, dissident shareholders will ask questions on behalf of Zambian villagers who are suing Vedanta in the UK for twelve years of polluted water, as well as tribal inhabitants of the Niyamgiri hills in Odisha, India who accuse Vedanta of murdering and harassing them with state collusion.
Protesters in London will pour scorn on Vedanta’s 2017 Annual Report, which claims that the company ‘demonstrate world-class standards of governance, safety, sustainability and social responsibility’. They say it represents a poor attempt to don the ‘cloak of respectability'(3) of a London listing, pointing out that:
Vedanta was again excluded from the Norwegian Pension Fund’s investments this year following an investigation which found “numerous reports of Vedanta’s failure to comply with government requirements”1 at four subsidiaries in Odisha, Chhatisgarh, Tamil Nadu and Zambia. The report concludes, “there continues to be an unacceptable risk that your company will cause or contribute to severe environmental damage and serious or systematic human rights violations.”
Vedanta’s Annual Report makes no mention of its liabilities relating to the landmark legal case in which 1,826 Zambian farmers have been granted jurisdiction to sue Vedanta in London for gross pollution by its subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines (KCM).(4)
At the July appeal hearing in the case, Vedanta’s lawyers claimed that the company’s sustainability and human rights reports are only produced for show as a requirement of London Stock Exchange rules. Instead, they claimed Vedanta Resources has very little actual oversight or involvement with subsidiary operations such as Konkola Copper Mines.2
Vedanta are again subject of an international arbitration for withholding $100 million in dividends from Cairn Energy, owner of 9.8% shares in Vedanta controlled oil company Cairn India.3 In December 2016 London courts ordered Vedanta subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines to pay $103 million in withheld dividends to Zambian State entity ZCCM-IH.4
The Rajasthani High Court has uncovered a Rs 600 crore ($96 million) tax evasion scam in which Vedanta subsidiary Hindustan Zinc Ltd benefitted from tax fraud at the hands of shamed IAS officer Ashok Singhvi in 2015.5
While their Annual Report claims to respect the right to ‘Free Prior Informed Consent’, Vedanta has not given up its plans to mine the Niyamgiri hills, despite a unanimous referendum against it by tribal inhabitants in 2013. The Odisha Mining Corporation has filed a new plea with the National Green Tribunal to overturn the referendum, claiming it overstepped the provisions of the Forest Rights Act by allowing Palli Sabhas to decide on mining, rather than merely settling their claims.6
The Dongria Konds of Niyamgiri will hold a protest before the AGM demanding the dismantling the Lanjigarh refinery, and an end to its illegal expansion. They will also demand the release of Dongria activists from jail, decrying the ongoing abductions, false arrests and State sponsored murders of tribal activists against Vedanta’s mine. In May Kuni Sikaka, a 20 year old Dongria woman and active Niyamgiri Suraksha Samiti member, whose father in law is NSS leader Dadhi Pusika, was removed from her home and kept in police jail for 3 days, where she was told to surrender as a Maoist or be jailed for 15 years. On 7th April 2016 Dasru Kadraka, a 25-year-old Adivasi youth leader and activist of NSS, was arrested and tortured with electric shocks by police asking him to surrender as a Maoist. An all female fact finding team comprising of senior Indian activists detailed these abuses in May 2017.7 In September 2016 a group of Dongria Kond had burned down a CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force) camp, opposing construction of a road connecting Niyamgiri to Kalyansingpur, which they claim is to aid Vedanta’s mine plans, and opposing ongoing harassment by the force.8
In Zambia severely polluted villagers will submit questions to be asked by dissident shareholders at the London AGM.(5) Government officials visited their villages in Spring this year asking them to drop the London case against Vedanta and settle out of court with the company.
Samarendra Das from Foil Vedanta says:
“The Government of UK and Government of India are directly responsible for failing to investigate Vedanta’s corporate crimes in Zambia and India respectively. The Govt of India’s militarising Niyamgiri and the Zambian State’s threats to farmers suffering from pollution demonstrate the ongoing colonial power of this British corporation. Britain is profiting from the financial transactions of non-domiciled family-run business houses like Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta, while appearing to provide them a service. The opaqueness of the British financial system is gaining directly from giving Anil Agarwal “a cloak of respectability” and in exchange Britain itself is gaining from appropriating the resources of the third world.”
Former Rio Tinto CEO Tom Albanese will step down from Vedanta’s board at this year’s AGM along with executives Euan MacDonald and Aman Mehta. Vedanta’s CEO of Zambian operations Steven Din has recently been accused of offering bribes for the Simandou iron ore mine by the former Guinean mining minister, as part of a major corruption investigation. Din was head of Rio Tinto’s Guinean operation at the time the scandal unfolded, while Tom Albanese was CEO.9
Recent analyst reports highlight Vedanta’s high debt, lack of bauxite at Lanjigarh refinery, and operational issues in Zambia.
(1) Vedanta is a FTSE 250 diversified oil and mining company, which has been named the
‘world’s most hated company’ by the Independent newspaper for their long list of
environmental and human rights crimes for which they are being opposed all over the
world.10
(2) Foil Vedanta is a London based international solidarity group focusing on the activities of British mining company Vedanta. We link up global communities affected by Vedanta, and hold them to account in London. We are currently making the case for Vedanta to be de-listed from the London Stock Exchange for their human rights and corporate governance abuses.
(3) Former Director General of the Confederation of British Industries, Richard Lambert, stated: ‘It never occurred to those of us who helped to launch the FTSE 100 index 27 years ago that one day it would be providing a cloak of respectability and lots of passive investors for companies that challenge the canons of corporate governance such as Vedanta…’. .11
(4) 1,826 of the most affected villagers won the right to have their case against KCM and Vedanta, demanding compensation for personal injury and loss of livelihood due to gross pollution, heard in UK courts in May 2016. Vedanta’s appeal to the judgment was heard in July 2017 and a verdict is expected in September/October.
Justice Coulson’s May judgement indicted KCM for financial secrecy, historic dishonesty and attempts to pervert the course of justice, revealing that KCM have never filed any annual accounts in accordance with the Zambian Companies Act, and referring to a 2014 London arbitration case against KCM in which three judges found KCM to be dishonest, obstructive and willing to cause unnecessary harm.12
(5) Reports have detailed how twelve years of pollution by KCM has turned the river Kafue into a ‘river of acid’13 14 and left the farmers with no access to clean water. As well as suing KCM and Vedanta in the UK for personal injury and loss of livelihood due to gross pollution, the villagers are demanding that KCM de-silt and remediate the contaminated areas so they can return to normal life.
An estimated 40,000 people in total are affected by contaminated water which also affects the municipal piped water system15. A number of scientific papers have documented the extent of contamination, with acid pH and heavy metal content regularly tens and even hundreds of times above legal limits.16 17 18
One villager Judith Kapumba appears in a youtube video testifying to how contamination has destroyed their livelihood and their lives, claiming that many have ‘collapsed and died’ as a result of illnesses caused by drinking contaminated water, and that crops can no longer grow leading to starvation and extreme poverty.19
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Notes
1. http://www.foilvedanta.org/news/vedanta-excluded-again-by-norwegian-pension-fund/
2. Dominic Liswaniso Lungowe & Others v. Vedanta Resources Plc and Konkola Copper Mines Plc, 27 May 2016
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/TCC/2016/975.html
http://www.foilvedanta.org/news/police-this-gateway-report-on-london-appeal-hearing-of-vedanta-vs-lungowe/
3. http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/cairn-moves-international-arbitration-panel-against-dividend-freeze/article18959785.ece
4. https://www.lusakatimes.com/2016/12/19/kcm-ordered-pay-zccm-ih-us103-million-14-days/
5. http://indianexpress.com/article/cities/jaipur/high-court-issues-notice-to-state-govt-acb-over-600-cr-benefit-to-vedanta-4778267/
6. http://www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/odisha-mining-corporation-to-move-ngt-for-fresh-bid-on-niyamgiri-mining-116110701280_1.html
7. https://peoplesvoice.in/2017/05/18/niyamgiri-suraksha-samiti-activists-subjected-illegal-detention/
http://www.caravanmagazine.in/vantage/odisha-bauxite-mining-fake-surrender-niyamgiri
8. http://odishatv.in/odisha/body-slider/tribals-torch-crpf-camp-opposing-road-construction-166726/
9. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-18/rio-tinto-offered-bribe-for-iron-mine-ex-guinea-official-says
10.http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/vedanta-resources-the-worlds-most-hatedcompany-2037977.html
11.http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201213/cmhansrd/cm120522/debtext/120522-0002.htm
12. Dominic Liswaniso Lungowe & Others v. Vedanta Resources Plc and Konkola Copper Mines Plc, 27 May 2016
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/TCC/2016/975.html
13. ‘Rivers of acid’ in Zambian villages, 8th September 2015. BBC. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-34173746
14. Bodhan Kribek et al, 2013, Methods of environmental monitoring in mining areas: The Zambian Copperbelt Case Story, Presentation from a training course, delivered at University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, July 13-15, 2013.
15. The New Colonialism: Britain’s scramble for African energy and mineral resources. War on Want, July 2016. http://www.waronwant.org/resources/new-colonialism-britains-scramble-africas-energy-and-mineral-resources
16. Ondra Sracek et al, 2011, ‘Mining-related contamination of surface water and sediments of the Kafue River drainage system in the Copperbelt district, Zambia: An example of a high neutralization capacity system’, Journal of Geochemical Exploration, 112 (2012) 174–188.
17. Bodhan Kribek et al, 2013, Methods of environmental monitoring in mining areas: The Zambian Copperbelt Case
Story, Presentation from a training course, delivered at University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, July 13 15, 2013.
18. For full coverage of the issue plus video testimonies see http://www.foilvedanta.org/articles/how-kcm-is-killing-the-zambian-copperbelt-part-1-water-pollution/
19. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cv325JlD1uo
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