River of Gold: How the State Lost Out in an Eastern Congo Gold Boom, While Armed Groups, a Foreign Mining Company and Provincial Authorities Pocketed Millions
Publisher: Global Witness
Date: 2016
Topics: Extractive Resources, Governance
Countries: Congo (DRC)
An estimated $28 billion worth of gold lies under the soil in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (hereafter Congo). But the country’s gold wealth, the majority of which is artisanally mined, has long been ill-used. Preyed upon by armed groups, bandits and corrupt elites the revenues generated by eastern Congo’s artisanal gold sector have all too often funded corruption or fuelled abuses and violent conflict rather than helping to relieve the region’s poverty.
Global Witness’ investigation into a recent gold rush along the Ulindi River in Shabunda territory in eastern Congo reveals the extent of the problems that beset the region’s artisanal gold sector. The Ulindi boom generated more than a tonne of gold per year, worth around $38 million, whose beneficiaries included armed groups and a predatory Chinese-owned company, Kun Hou Mining, rather than the local population.