A former employee of Anglogold Ashanti Ghana says the gradual collapse of Ghana’s oldest mine, Anglogold Ashanti is as a result of mismanagement by the managers.
Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show, Yiadom Boakye Amponsah, a former General Manager of Human Resources at Anglogold said the inability of Anglogold to make profits is due to mismanagement of its operation.
”It was simply mismanagement; before the meager, Obuasi was doing fine till 1999 when we had our problem due to the gold price and hedging challenges.”
He furthered explained that the new managers [Anglogold Ashanti] of the Obuasi mine have themselves to blame.
”In a matter of the 10 years that they have been here, they have used about eight or nine managers, which organisation can survive like that; every year or two you change management/structure, how do you hope to have continuity, ” he lamented.
Mr. Boakye Amponsah charged Anglogold to ”block all the loopholes and chart a new path” and ”interrogate why there was no profitability”.
Anglogold Ashanti on Thursday announced that it will cutdown its workforce by August this year because of the rising cost of production, high under-performance of workers and unstable world market prices.
The company is likely to lay off about 5000 of its workers.
The company is also expected to spend about $220 million in settlement packages, which is being negotiated for among the management, the local union and representatives of the Ghana Mine Workers Union.
Mr. Boakye Amponsah said decision by the company to lay-off workers is unfortunate and misplaced.
”I can only say that its unfortunate; I believe that there are a lot interventions we can consider apart from the path we are chart,” he said.
But Mr. Boakye Amponsah said the Obuasi mine has experienced such challenges before, saying ”I believe that there are a lot of interventions we can consider; I think we have a second look at the programme go through a serious re-think and possibly review what they are doing…”
He noted that the about 80 percent of the people who will be laid-off will mismanage the retrenchment packages that will be given them and come back to Obuasi.
He expressed the fear that Obuasi mine is likely to ‘die’ if things continue to go as it is.”The approach by Anglogold is wrong; the timing is an issue; a lot more thought process should go into the strategy…,” he said.
Meanwhile some traditional leaders in Obuasi are unhappy about the retrenchment exercise.
In an interview with Citi News,Nana Anokye Kwaw Tutu the second Akrofuom Nifahene and Adokwaahene of the Obuasi traditional area said the Anglogold Ashanti’s move is not human centered.
”To me its not human centered; I have so many reservations about it…,” he said.
Anglogold said due to the increase in the world price of gold in 2008 which raked in a lot of profit, the company was encouraged to pump in about $600 million from its mother company in South Africa, only to notice that it was a wrong move.
A Senior Vice-President of AngloGold Ashanti Ghana, Mr Mark Morcombe said on Thursday that the company had to face the challenges head-on and was taking the “short-term pain for a long-term success”.
By: Evans Effah/citifmonline.com/Ghana