Government has ordered for the immediate close down of the Ghana Manganese Company Limited (GMCL) located in Tarkwa in the Western Region.

The directive which came through the Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Mr Kwaku Asomah-Cheremeh halts all mining, exploration and export of minerals activities of the company.

The shut down is due to alleged nonpayment of taxes and price manipulation between the periods of 2010 to 2017.

The company has been under investigation since February 2019 after preliminary checks of its finances revealed several infractions.

Addressing a news conference in Accra yesterday, at which he announced the shutdown, Mr Asomah-Cheremeh said the country lost $12.8 million in royalties due, $79 million in corporate taxes due and $6.1 million in dividends.

“GMCL has not shown strong commitment to value addition in particular. There are also defaults by the company in the payment of annual minerals rights fees in excess of 4 million dollars. These and several infractions give me no option as the sector Minister than to close down the operations of GMCL.”

“The company is therefore instructed to stop all mining exploration and export of minerals effective 6th August 2019. The Ministry together with the Minerals Commission and other relevant stakeholders will immediately commence discussions with Ghana Manganese to resolve this and other outstanding issues in the course of the shutdown.”


"Additionally, revenue residing offshore for the period 2010 to 2017 also amounted to $259 million. The estimated losses were based on a fair pricing model, utilising best business practices, open source data, as well as information obtained from verifiable business intelligence centres," he said.

The minister explained that no transfer pricing audit was performed prior to 2017.

He stressed that the abundance of evidence of infractions by the company left him with no option but to order the closure of the company until the outstanding issues had been addressed.