Despite an appeal to de facto Public Health Minister Volda Lawrence and other authorities to suspend mining in Chinese Landing due to fears over the possible spread of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in the Region One community, Toshao Orin Fernandes says there has been no response.

Although mining has been deemed an essential service that has been partially exempted from restrictions instituted to curb the spread of COVID-19, there is a provision for a Village Council, once it has determined that a public health threat exists in relation to any mining or forestry operation carried out as an essential service, to recommend to the minister that the operation be discontinued.

In a letter sent to Lawrence in April and seen by this newspaper, Fernandes called for urgent intervention as he said that mining activities are being carried out on titled land in the village without any permission from the village council.

“We look helpless[ly] every day at people coming into our village, setting up shops and working dredges and pumps.

Since our village has no gates and is open, people from all walks of life continue to pour into our village at various points,” he wrote.