An independent financial analyst, Sydney Casely-Hayford has accused the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of being business unfriendly.
According to him, EPA’s handling of the of the Exton Cubic Group’s bauxite deal has not been encouraging.
“We have an EPA that is coming across to me as very business unfriendly.
This is a very unfriendly way of encouraging local business persons to move on,” he said.
EPA had given the company the permit to prospect bauxite in the Tano-Offin Forest Reserve in the Ashanti Region but later asked the company to halt operations because Exton Cubic breached certain conditions in the permit.
Although the Lands and Natural Resource Minister, Peter John Amewu cleared Exton Cubic of any wrongdoing, the EPA insists the company has no right to enter the forest.
The Public Relations Officer of Exton Cubic, Sammy Gyamfi had said the company has so far spent $20 million dollars on the prospecting deal hence their current predicament has been a headache to their business partners. Speaking on the Big Issue on Saturday, Casely-Hayford said EPA’s posture will deter other local businesses from growing.
“If a company has sank 20 million dollars already into this prospecting initiative and intends to do a lot more with a whole integrated aluminum factory coming up and presumably that will entail another 200 million before trying to recoup its investment, the least you can do is to give them all the support they need and encourage them in order to get things done and especially so when they are going to create employment of about 20,000 to the youth.”
“It’s time we stop doing this big person mentality thing that we do and get a little bit closer to the people who we are regulating and see what their challenges really are and how we can assist them to move the project forward,” he added.
Exton battles government for trucks
In a related development, Exton Cubic is currently battling the Ashanti Regional Minister, Simon Osei Mensah and the Atwima Mponua District Chief Executive for confiscating trucks and equipment belonging to Ibrahim Mahama’s Engineers and Planners (E&P), a civil engineering company Exton engaged to help it prospect the bauxite in the forest reserve.
Although the regional minister insists that it will only release the equipment when he receive proper documentation from Exton Cubic, the company’s PRO has said Mr. Osei Mensah has refused to give meet them.
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