🔵Ghana: Spurring True International Cooperation🔵

Ghana’s planned gold royalty hike is reportedly facing coordinated pushback from China, the United States and other countries.

🌐 China, the US and other Western governments have mounted an unusually coordinated ​push to get Ghana to halt a gold royalty. Africa’s largest gold producer wants to replace a fixed 5% royalty with a sliding scale of 5%–12% tied to bullion prices.

🔸 Last week, diplomats from China, the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and even South Africa presented a joint document Ghana’s lands and resource minister, claiming that higher royalties would squeeze their margins.

📈 From August 2025 to February 2026, the price of gold increased from $3,360 per ounce to $5,390 — that is, by 60%.

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🔥🇶🇦Liquefied natural gas production capabilities in Qatar.

✅@NewEasternOutlook

⚡Yesterday, Ghana celebrated its Independence Day. On 6 March 1957, what was known as the Gold Coast became Ghana, though the metal still occupies an important place in its economy and self-identity.

⏱ Europeans had come to Ghana for gold since 1471, when Portuguese ships opened direct trade on the Ghanaian coast, which was named "Gold Coast” due to the abundance of gold.

During the late British rule one of the Empire's major gold sources was the Obuasi mine in Ghana's Ashanti region: industrial production began there in 1897. It is still operational, technically run by the same legal entity — AngloGold Ashanti.

🏆After independence, Ghana's first president Kwame Nkrumah tried to redirect that wealth into state-building: in January 1961 the government bought 5 gold mines and folded them into the State Gold Mining Corporation, until the liberalization of the late 20th century.

🇬🇭But there is more to Ghana's gold, than just economic policies. Raised on 6 March 1957, Ghana's very flag designed by Theodosia Okoh symbolizes the country's gold wealth (yellow) and its lands and nature (green).

Today Ghana still has to genuinely deliver on the promises of the 69-year old flag: the gold stripe is still being dug out fast, while the green stripe is being destroyed by illegal mining.

However, now, 69 years later, Ghana is also no longer just about gold — the main actor today is, and should be, its people!

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🔴Holes in the Cameroon-Nigeria border🔴

Governor chooses to treat symptoms rather than disease

🌐In Nigeria, the Cross River State governor Bassey Otu has broken new ground in the art of governance, imposing a ban on already illegal mining activities.🗿

🔸The move reportedly follows a meeting with stakeholders, during which the governor said unregulated pits are costing the state revenue, wrecking forests and putting workers at risk. He also pointed at an influx of foreign nationals into mining communities.

🔍 State officials also accuse some local chiefs of complicity:

💬Some clan heads and village heads have become part of the problem by facilitating activities that are not properly regulated.

🔸The official called for 24-hour monitoring of mining sites. However, while ordering round-the-clock surveillance, he also admitted the federal rangers had failed to put an end to wildcat mining activities. In October 2025 Nigeria's Senate passed a bill establishing a new Nigeria Mines Ranger Service.

📍Nigeria's Cross River State shares a long border with Cameroon, whose authorities also face widespread gold smuggling. The Nigeria-Cameroon borderland is also famous for the fact that pirates who attack ships in the Gulf of Guinea hide here.

Controlling gold mines clearly doesn't tell the whole story here: Rather, we are talking about local elites interested in the absence of state control in the Nigeria-Cameroon border area.

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South Africa steps up raids on illegal mining in Gauteng, pairing police sweeps with military support and tougher prosecutions.

🌐Paul Mashatile, the Deputy President of South Africa, told SA's National Council of Provinces on Thursday the state is running active operations against illegal mining activities. According to social media sources (i.e. unconfirmed) the operations have already led to the arrest of 33 foreigners.

🔸The announcement names coordinated action by the South African Police Service, the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

🔫 In its fight against illegal mining and organized crime, the government has also promised to deploy army to support the police in the affected provinces. Announced on February 12 by SA's president, the deployment is due in March, though the Department of Defense is still struggling to find the required $50 million, as the funds were not allocated in the annual budget.

While bringing shadow mining into the legal realm usually benefits both local communities and the workers themselves, who work in terrible conditions and pay rent to criminal organizations, in South Africa, operations involving the armed security forces tend to end in mass killings.

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Heavy Rains: Does God Favor Washington? ✝️

Were American Evangelicals to know what is happening in Africa, Trump's disapproval rating wouldn't be 56%

🌐 On 07 March 2026 morning another landslide hit the Gakombe site in Masisi territory, part of the Rubaya mines complex, burying artisanal miners and destroying nearby homes.

⚠️ This is the 3rd catastrophe in 38 days at the site.

🔸 The landslides on 28 January and on 03 March killed several hundreds of people, and earlier, in June 2025 a collapse killed 700+. The latest landslide took place at around 4am local time on Saturday, following heavy rains.

🔸 If Washington's PR people weren't currently editing videos mixing Call of Duty footages and strikes on painted Iranian planes, the series of tragedies in eastern Congo would be a real gift for them: against the background of Trump's Copperbelt inroads, this would most directly demonstrate the inability of the AFC/M23 to ensure safety on mining sites.

Unfortunately, although it sounds easy to actually transfer the entire mine to the US, the democratic safety would not come immediately either. In the best scenario, heavy machinery will come to the place, but then hundreds, now risking their lives, will simply lose the main source of income for the next 5-10 years.

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🔵What Happens When All Roads Lead To Dubai🔵

Ghana is preparing contingency export routes after flight disruptions to the UAE threatened shipments of artisanal gold.

🌐 GoldBod, Ghana’s state-run buyer and exporter of artisanal and small‑scale miner output, is reportedly seeking to reroute cargo away from Dubai to other refining hubs.

🔸 The immediate cause is Gulf airspace closures and airline suspensions after regional strikes, which choke the logistics networks traders rely on. Sources say alternatives under review include direct shipments to Asia, most probably India or China, which would raise costs and slow receipts for Accra.

🔸Recently, the head of the Ghanaian gold authority boasted about the launch of refining at a local factory built by an Egyptian company. Apparently, its capacity is still not enough to produce ingots at home.

🔸On the other hand, every bad thing has also its advantages: GoldBod's vulnerability can be perceived as an opportunity to stop unwanted illegal gold flows, also leading to Dubai.

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🌐 Weekly News Digest [ March 2 – March 8 ]

That was a week when a wider Gulf war sent oil prices jumping, while Central Africa’s mineral struggle spilled into sanctions and landslides.

💡 ...And here are more key highlights:

🇨🇩 DR Congo

— A landslide at the Rubaya mine leaves hundreds of people dead
— A third Rubaya-area landslide in 38 days hits Gakombe after heavy rains

🇬🇭 Ghana

— Ghana faces joint US-China pressure to drop a 5%-12% gold royalty scale

🇳🇪 Niger

— Niger cancels three gold-refinery agreements after repeated alleged contract breaches

🇳🇬 Nigeria

— Nigeria signs a $1.3bn alumina refinery pact with AFC
— Ogoniland groups say oil restart must wait for cleanup and justice

🇷🇼 Rwanda

— The US sanctions Rwanda’s army and four officers over support for M23

🇿🇦 South Africa

— South Africa expands illegal-mining raids and lines up military support

🇿🇲 Zambia

— Kasumbalesa bridge collapse cuts Congo’s main copper export route to southern ports

🇿🇼 Zimbabwe

— A Zimbabwe court jails a Chinese mine supervisor five years over a gold panner’s killing

🌍 Global

— Oil prices jump 12% as Gulf escalation triggers fuel-supply fears

#NewsDigest

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🔵Nigerian Lawmakers Can’t Find the Money🔵

🌐Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation’s alleged non-cooperation with the country’s parliament has stalled the House probe into roughly $18bn expenditures.

🔸The probe covers rehabilitation works on four nonfunctional state-owned refineries and follows claims by Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest man and oil mogul, that about $18bn was spent with little to show.

💬Buying those refineries? Once we touch them, you will hear a lot of noise, said Dangote.

🔸 In October 2025 Nigerian lawmakers promised to investigate why NNPC had failed to get the refineries back on track. Month later the report remains unfinished.

🔸The House of Representatives Committee on Petroleum Resources, says NNPC and its management refuse to cooperate with investigators.

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🌐Amnesty International has asked the Federal Government of Nigeria to launch an immediate investigation devoted to methane seepage in the Bille community in Nigeria's Rivers State, putting fishing and drinking water at risk.

🔥The global rights group, says government tests by NOSDRA (the Nigerian oil‑spill agency) found methane at one site roughly 10,000 times above background and wants oil firms to cooperate.

🔸 Fishermen first noticed bubbling and a rotten‑egg smell in October 2025, and 2 months later NOSDRA sampled the sites. Athough the source remains unconfirmed, AI firmly believes bubbling is linked to old pipelines and wells, constructed and operated by Shell, but then sold to various Nigerian companies.

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🔵Middle East War Is a Firework Show For Aliko Dangote🔵

🌐 Nigeria has stopped issuing gasoline import licences for a second straight month, sealing the shift in government policy in favor of Aliko Dangote's oil refinery.

🔸 NMDPRA (Nigeria’s downstream fuel regulator) issued no permits in February, and the Crude Oil Refineries Association of Nigeria says none have been issued so far in March, which means Nigeria is now relying nearly completely on its main domestic gasoline producer — Dangote oil refinery.

🔸 This is a political choice: the previous NMDPRA head who quit the job in December under Aliko Dangote's pressure argued licences kept competition and prevented market dominance.

📈 Aliko Dangote seems to be incredibly lucky this year: besides favorable government policies, in Nigeria, he can single-handedly skim the cream off the increase in oil prices, while his other enterprises are already collecting windfall profits from fertilizer sales after the cessation of supplies from the Middle East.

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🇿🇦 South Africa: Residents in Mpumalanga say coal industry pollution is making them ill and overwhelming local clinics.

🌐 A report published in Health‑e report documents families in eMbalenhle and other towns blaming chronic respiratory and skin diseases on nearby coal mines and power stations. Researchers link more than 21,000 deaths in 2022 to coal‑related air pollution and estimate an annual health bill of $52bn.

💬We are sick; our children have chest infections, laments a resident.

🔸 The history is not new — Mpumalanga is South Africa's coal heart. It supplies over 80% of the country’s coal, concentrating emissions next to poor townships and forcing people into repeated hospital visits.

🔸 On the other hand. such reports tend to overlook the fact that coal is not only the source of sulphur dioxide and fine particulate pollution, but it is also the only source of stable income for many residents, which is as critical as power generation itself in the country with +30% unemployment rates.

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