In what is becoming a troubling pattern of defiance, ArcelorMittal Liberia has once again refused to honor a summons from the House of Representatives, ignoring its third official invitation to appear before a Joint Committee investigating the company’s compliance with its Mineral Development Agreement (MDA). The hearing, scheduled for Tuesday, July 1, 2025, was intended to scrutinize the terms of the company’s operations and its obligations under a massive US$1.4 billion investment deal tied to the construction of a concentrator plant in Yekepa, Nimba County.
Instead of showing up, ArcelorMittal Liberia sent a message louder than any testimony: it does not feel obligated to answer to the people’s elected representatives.
The company’s absence drew sharp public criticism, including from Nimba County Senator Nya D. Twayen, who questioned the motive behind AML’s noncompliance. “If you are doing the right thing accordingly,” he wrote on Facebook, “why would you be afraid to appear before the people’s Representatives?” His words reflect a growing national concern about whether the benefits of foreign investment in Liberia are worth the continued erosion of transparency and legislative authority.
The Joint Committee, backed by the Committees on Lands, Mines, Energy, Natural Resources, Environment, and Labor, had formally requested five years of financial data from AML. This included records of iron ore production, reports on corporate social responsibility projects, a breakdown of scholarship disbursements, and documentation of AML’s support to the University of Liberia’s Geological Department. A list of Liberian nationals in senior and managerial positions was also required, along with a full community impact assessment.
This was not an ambush or a fishing expedition. It was a deliberate and overdue exercise in oversight. Liberia’s lawmakers, amid mounting public pressure, are simply asking whether the world’s second-largest steel company is fulfilling its promises to the country and its people. Unfortunately, ArcelorMittal’s continued refusal to appear is casting serious doubt on those promises.
The context for this controversy is important. Just weeks ago, on June 5, AML commissioned its US$1.4 billion concentrator plant, a facility meant to signal a major expansion of its operations and a renewed commitment to Liberia. But the pageantry of the ribbon-cutting ceremony failed to impress local residents and lawmakers alike. In Yekepa and its surrounding towns, the plant’s towering infrastructure looms over communities still plagued by poverty, crumbling roads, and a sense of betrayal.
If a US$1.4 billion project cannot translate into clean water, quality schools, and decent jobs for the communities that host it, then what, exactly, is being developed? Liberia has seen too many such investments, big on figures and fanfare, but painfully small on outcomes.
The deeper issue here is one of accountability. By ignoring the Legislature, ArcelorMittal is not just snubbing a committee; it is undermining Liberia’s democratic process and testing the limits of state authority. No private company, no matter how powerful or well-funded, should be allowed to operate above the law.
With the Senate now calling for a similar hearing later this week, the pressure on AML is mounting. But pressure without enforcement means little. The House and Senate must move beyond strong language and symbolic summonses. If AML continues to defy the Legislature, then contempt proceedings must be pursued, and the terms of its Mineral Development Agreement should be reviewed publicly.
Liberia’s minerals belong to the Liberian people, not to foreign corporations and not to a select group of elites. Until that principle is respected in both law and practice, no amount of billion-dollar investments will bring real, lasting change.
Like this:
Like Loading…
