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Oil Palm Company, GVL “embroiled in corporate evil”- says Liberia Rights official

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A Commissioner at the Independent National Commission on Human Rights (INCHR), James Torh has described the oil pam company in southeastern Liberia, Golden Veroleum (GVL) as “embroiled in controversy and a face of cooperate evil,” but the Asian company is yet to respond.

Commissioner Torch says in a press release issued on Tuesday, November 26, 2019, that the Company has failed to comply with the UN Global Compact that calls for Extractive companies to observe the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the fundamental principles of rights at work, and the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.

He also said that GVL also failed to put in place minimal infrastructures such as, clinics/hospitals and some schools and human rights are eroded and non-existent since its establishment more than six years ago, in Sorodken District, Grand Kru County.

Mr Torh, who has just returned from the Southeast with a team of three on human rights assessment mission, says GVL destroyed communities and wreck livelihood of local people, plundering and exploiting resources and labor and guilty of environmental crimes.

The INCHR Commissioner made particular reference to the act of burying tons of palms that the company is unable to process. “Moreover in contravention of Chapter 45(c)(i) of the Decent Work Act of Liberia, GVL has employed Indians to man its warehouses.

The Act stipulates that a foreign worker may be employed for a job only if there is no suitably qualified Liberian available to carry out the work required by the employer,” he said in his press release.

Mr. Torh argues further that GVL is not investing in local communities, but rather reaping huge profits built on the backs of poverty-stricken citizens and should be regulated to improve standard of living of workers and local communities.

‘’Our Government should not operate in the state of willful blindness and ignorance to the activities of GVL’s greed but rather insist on compliance with corporate social responsibilities as well as reproof the concession’s unspeakable human rights and environmental violations,’’ the Independent National Commissioner on Human Rights insisted in his press release he signed after his trip to southeastern Liberia

The presence of ERU Police officers on the premises of GVL Sorodken District office in Grand Kru County armed with assaulted rifles to bring any situation under control is confusing and particularly cruel and blatant violation of the workers’ rights and should be framed as a sign of intimidation that puts their rights at risk. 

Mr. Torh also caled on the Weah-led Government to take concrete actions to address the suffering and hardship in the country.

According to the INCHR Commissioner, the prevailing hunger, anger and frustrations in the faces of our people throughout Liberia that make them feel insecure and less-valued as well as the worry state of affairs is a profound sense of betrayal of the hopes and aspirations of Liberians.   

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