The 0.3% levy: thirty organisations and the FEC demand that the consensus-based order be signed

The Coordination of Advocacy Actions for Natural Resource Governance, Makuta ya Maendeleo, Congo Is Not For Sale (CNPAV), and the Platform of Civil Society Organisations Working in the Mining Sector (POM) joined by the Federation of Congolese Enterprises (FEC) are urging the Ministers of Mines and Social Affairs to sign, without delay, the inter-ministerial order approving the management manual for the 0.3% levy on mining companies’ turnover earmarked for community development.

The signatories are particularly troubled that the two ministers sent the Prime Minister a document that contradicts both the letter and the spirit of the revised Mining Code, setting aside the manual that complies with articles 258 bis and 285 octies and that stakeholders had broadly endorsed. This deadlock, they argue, stems from legally groundless debates and from manoeuvring by certain public bodies, notably the National Fund for Social Promotion and Service (FNPSS), which is seeking to impose centralised management of the levy to the detriment of the beneficiary communities. Yet the consensus on the manual is long-standing and solid: it emerged from tripartite work led by the two ministries with civil society and mining companies between October 2019 and December 2020, and was confirmed by the FEC Chamber of Mines at its Lubumbashi workshop in June 2021 and by the IDAK dialogue forum, both of which recommended immediate signature along the lines of Tenke Fungurume Mining’s social fund.

The organisations therefore call on the two ministers to sign the order in line with that consensus and the Mining Code.