The workshop brings together 120 participants from across the world including government officials, private sector representatives, NGOs, international organizations such the World Bank, the African Union Commission, Academics, and 61 advanced law students and legal professionals from 23 African universities and 19 African countries.
It is hosted by the University of Kigali and organized African Legal Support Facility (ALSF).
Mining disputes come about and get difficult to resolve due to diverse players involved in the industry. The disputes involve socio-economic-political environment conflicts.
According to the Secretary General of Kigali International Arbitration Centre, Dr. Joseph Fidele Masengo who took participants in the workshop, to a presentation on “Arbitration in Mining Industry”, on the 7th day of the AMLA 2018, mining disputes can be contractual, trade venture, investment, expropriation and labour employment disputes though the latest are not frequent.
Contracts that can bear disputes in mining as they bring in the government officials in charge of making policies and laws governing the industry, the population who can be affected by environmental impacts, employees of the extracting companies, banks financing the extracting projects, insurance companies coming in case of disasters and other stakeholders according to Dr. Masengo.
Masengo said that in case of mining disputes, people choose arbitration as the suitable way to resolve them because “using the normal judges is not the right way.”
He said that this is due to the confidentiality, flexibility (mutual understanding), quickness in disputes resolution compared to time taken in normal courts, and the easy implementation of decisions made by arbitrators.
Masengo also explained that most arbitrators are specialized in diverse sectors, which gives them ability to understand and deal adequately with disputes related with those sectors. There can be arbitrators specialized in engineering, construction, economy among other sectors.
Dr. Masengo revealed that since its foundation six years ago, Kigali International Arbitration Centre (KIAC) has now trained 500 arbitrators and it has resolved 97 mining disputes worth $50 million.
“Rwanda does not receive a lot of mining disputes compared to countries with so much mineral resources in their lands,” Dr. Masengo said adding that “Mining disputes are usually due to contracts.”
“At KIAC, mining disputes come sixth as the sector with many disputes resolved at our centre and as time goes, we do receive disputes from the region and those inside Rwanda,”Dr Masengo revealed.
The Head of Law Department at the University of Kigali, Idi Gaparayi said that arbitration is preferred in resolving mining disputes due to high presence of foreign investors in local mining industries who don’t much trust laws governing businesses in host countries.
“Contracts in mining industry usually involve foreign investors who sometimes don’t trust laws in countries where they operate from. They then choose arbitration in resolving mining disputes in case they take place. You will find foreign investors in mining having more trust in arbitration that the normal courts and laws,” Dr. Gaparayi said.
The 2018 African Mining Legislation Atlas (AMLA) was held at Kigali Serena Hotel and implemented by the University of Kigali, the ALSF, the World Bank’s Legal vice Presidency, the Extractive Industries Technical Assistance Facilities (EI-TAF), the African Union Commission (AUC) ), and several African law faculties.
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