Market day in the riverside town of Gbitti in eastern Cameroon is a colorful affair. Farmers sit on the bare red earth, their wares spread out before them. Across the narrow stretch of the Kadei River that separates Cameroon from the Central African Republic, merchants and shoppers haul wooden canoes by pulling on a steel rope stretched between the two banks. Children squeal and splash in the muddy waters where women beat their washing on nearby stones.
On the sandy river bank in February stood a man dressed in jeans, a jacket and grey knit cap, with a practiced air of nonchalance. But his eyes gave him away, darting right and left, scanning for danger as he negotiated – perhaps for the following Monday – the delivery of rough diamonds.
Suddenly the deal was cut short. A teenager brandishing a spear shouted from across the river, “Stop talking to our brother!” Armed young men, members of the Christian militia rebel group known as the Anti-Balaka, which emerged during the Central African Republic’s brutal civil war, were watching from the opposite banks and had spotted this reporter’s camera.
“We have lost our families in the war. We do not want to be filmed,” one young man in a bright red bandana shouted.
“The diamond in two weeks,” the merchant muttered, and he moved swiftly away to quell the ruckus from his comrades across the river.
Money for Rebels
Although elections brought a new government to power in February, the conflict has wreaked havoc on the economy, starvation has followed and hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled, many into UN camps in Cameroon. The government is too weak to assert full control over the mineral-rich country, and a low intensity conflict has persisted.
The violence has robbed the Central African Republic’s government of an important source of income from the diamond trade, which had accounted for as much as 20 percent of its budget. But when war broke out, the small nation at the heart of Africa was suspended from the Kimberley Process (KP), a 2003 accord signed by 81 countries to certify the origin of diamonds and prevent them from funding rebel groups. Without KP certification, the Central African Republic was completely locked out of the international gemstone market. (It won a partial reprieve last June.)
As the doors to legal trade swung shut, neighboring Cameroon became an outlet for laundering CAR diamonds into the global marketplace. Cameroon had only joined the Kimberley Process in 2012, and the government launched campaigns in the border towns to educate KP officials about spotting conflict diamonds.
But a year-long investigation by 100Reporters has found serious cracks in Cameroon’s system: Rough diamonds from the Central African Republic are easy to purchase here; enforcement of the certification rules is lax; and dealers speak openly of Kimberley Process officials, who will certify – for the right price – that gems from across the border are conflict free–whatever their origin. This reporter, posing as a buyer, found one KP official willing to falsify certificates for rough diamonds and assist in evading export taxes.
Cameroon’s Minister of Mines, Industry and Technological Development Ernest Ngwaboubou, who is responsible for overseeing the rough diamond industry and enforcing KP standards, declined requests to comment.
Guns and Diamonds
“It is difficult to determine, even in times of conflict, whether a machete or spear is intended for lawful use,” said a major in the infantry battalion stationed in a field office in Eastern Cameroon, about 250 kilometers from the regional capital of Bertoua. He refused to reveal his name because he is not authorized to speak for the military.
Diamond and gold smuggling was rife in the region even before the CAR civil war. The Kimberley Process secretariat has estimated that as much as 20 percent of rough diamonds from CAR were illegally traded prior to 2013. The World Bank in 2010 put the estimate even higher, at 50 percent.
The trade in rough diamonds between the two countries once was quite lucrative. François Nganke, an artisanal miner from Gbitti in his mid 30s, said he left a secure job with the humanitarian medical organization Doctors Without Borders for the lure of gemstones, which he sold across the border in CAR. “The prices charged by Central African purchasing offices were interesting. We sold our stones to them,” he said.
But the CAR trade collapsed when that country was suspended from the Kimberley Process in 2013, and its prices for rough diamonds plunged. Nganke now regrets his change of career. Mining is back-breaking work. In Gbitti men, women and children each day hack at the dry earth with old pickaxes, hoes and shovels sifting through the alluvial deposits for buried treasure. “It is painful. We need a pump” to wash the gems free from the soil, said one mother who has worked as a miner for five years.
Around her lay giant clods of earth and gaping holes, a testament to the sheer physical effort required to earn a living. “Sometimes we provide all this effort for nothing,” she said.
Today these small-scale miners in Cameroon face mounting competition from smugglers. “The majority of diamonds sold in Gbitti come from Central African Republic,” said Issa Bouba, a registered diamond dealer for the Cameroonian Ministry of Mines. He buys from the miners and sells the stones on international markets.
``This is Business``
The Central African Republic the world’s 12th largest producer of rough diamonds measured by value. The stones are round and 12-sided with a greenish-brown tint. Despite these distinctive qualities, tracing their origin is particularly difficult. The vast majority of production is done by artisanal miners sifting the deposits by hand for gems, sold to intermediary merchants called collectors. Moreover, 80 percent of the Central African Republic’s output comes from the southwestern region of the country bordering Cameroon, and the gems produced from the two countries are very similar in color and quality. Kimberley Process officials in Cameroon who certify the origin of the diamonds find them difficult to tell apart. They rely upon the collectors to maintain a production book, recording where the miners say they extracted the stones.
“With 20,000 artisanal miners in Cameroon and limited ability to monitor those miners, it is impossible to be sure where each diamond recorded in that book has come from,” said Amnesty International in its report “Chains of Abuse: The Global Diamond Supply Chain and the Case of the Central African Republic.”
Human rights groups say the illegal trade in diamonds is closely interlinked with a vicious cycle of violence on both sides of the border. It has helped keep a low-intensity conflict alive in the Central African Republic, spawning horrific attacks that have driven people from their homes. Starving families have waded across the narrow Kadei River to find refuge in Cameroon, the United Nations has reported. More than 200,000 Central African refugees have fled to Eastern Cameroon, and some have brought the illegal trade in diamonds with them.
Adam Abba, 45, a Central African Republic merchant now living in Kentzou, sat legs crossed on a mat in his two-room house, provided by the refugee agency of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and brightly painted in its signature blue. Here in Kentzou, hundreds of Muslims like him collect and sell Central African diamonds from areas controlled by the Muslim militia Seleka.
A jovial man, Abba shared a breakfast of red tea and white rice as he explained how he laundered blood diamonds from the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo through Cameroon.
“In the Kimberley Process office, even when the diamond comes from the Central African Republic, it is not complicated. The officials will say it comes from Cameroon. For this, you’re going to pay (a bribe). This is business, right?” Abba chortled.
“We are Africans. We understand each other,” he added.
Five hours drive to the north in Garoua-Boulaï, Aladji Samassa, another Central African Republic merchant tapped away on his new Samsung Galaxy tablet, scrolling through samples of diamonds that he had recently sold in Dubai.
“You see the stone with a red background? It is the most expensive. Arab customers like that,” Samassa said, displaying a photo of the glittering gem. Some of the most expensive diamonds evade the export tax in Cameroon, thanks to “someone” in the Kimberley Process secretariat whom Samassa said “makes things easier.”
100Reporters wanted to find out more about this “someone” and how the smuggling worked. This journalist telephoned officials at the regional secretariat of the Kimberley Process in Bertoua, the provincial capital. I introduced myself as a diamond collector seeking certification for Central African Republic diamonds.
I spoke with Dubois Ndamba, the senior Cameroonian official in the eastern region responsible for enforcing the Kimberley Process and certifying the origin of the diamonds. When asked about warnings issued by his superiors to watch out for blood diamonds from the Central African Republic, Ndamba brushed concerns aside. He said he knew what he was doing, adding that what he was doing “should not be vulgarized.” Ndamba offered to lower the tax and to provide fake certificates.
Here is an excerpt from the recorded telephone conversation between this reporter and the Ndamba, the Kimberley Process official:
Christian Locka: Mr. Dubois, hello.
Dubois Ndamba: Yes, hello?
CL: Dieudonne referred me, I do not know if he told you about my case? I’m in the diamond business, and I have Central African diamonds for export. We discussed this yesterday, and he gave me Saffana’s number, but it does not work. That’s why he gave me your number.
DN: Yes, explain yourself well so I understand.
CL: I have a partner who wants to export. I want to know how you can help.
DN: Help to do what?
CL: For export.
DN: You already have the diamonds in hand?
CL: They are in Garoua-Boulaï.
DN: What status do you have, you are collecting? You have the collector papers?
CL: I work with Mr Ndoko.
DN: This is how many carats?
CL: They are around 500.
DN: 500 carats?
CL: Yes.
DN: OK. I am in Yaoundé (Cameroon’s capital) right now. You are where, in Bertoua?
CL: I’m almost at Bertoua, I’m entering Bertoua.
DN: I am also going down to Bertoua, I would like you to call me. I expect to be in Bertoua in the evening or tomorrow morning.
CL: Okay, like that for the certificate?
DN: Yes.
CL: What must I do?
DN: For the certificate, this is where it starts. We will do the paperwork at the base so that the certificate will be given in Yaoundé, do you understand?
CL: Yes.
DN: You do the paperwork in Bertoua where we make appointments. We sign what we have to sign – just like that for the certificate. You go back to Yaoundé to the central Kimberley office. We will assess the value of the diamonds, what you are going to pay. You are given a valuation certificate and you pay the tax on this. Then, you are issued a certificate that allows you to get away with the diamond.
CL: The fact that they come from Central African Republic, I thought it would be concerning?
DN: It should disturb, but we will arrange the paperwork so that it no longer is from over there. We will act as if it originated from us (Cameroon) – you understand a little? – so that it is no more from over there (Central African Republic).
CL: I understand you.
DN: I know what it means, do not worry. We will arrange everything. Then we will see if there are some (diamonds) that are big. They can be put aside and carried beside you when you fly (to the diamond markets to sell them) so that they do not weigh down your luggage.
CL: OK.
DN: For calculating the tax, we take the light ones, which may be cheaper. We will do everything to do with the certificate.
CL: So, the bigger ones, we will set them aside?
DN: We will sort them, don’t worry. The most valuable diamonds, which can be expensive in taxes, you can put them aside. When you have the certificate of origin for the small value ones, I will add the others ones and you can export them all.
CL: OK. You are in Yaoundé; you say you’ll be in Bertoua when?
DN: I will be in Bertoua tonight. I am currently at the mines department.
CL: I call you tomorrow . . .
The next day, this reporter called Ndamba, and informed him that as a Kimberly Process official, he had offered to break the law. Ndamba denied it.
“I had no need to talk of CAR diamonds. You only have talked to me of CAR diamonds. I know that if you are in Cameroon and have diamonds in your hands, it is not foreign territory. So I would help in this direction by giving the diamonds a place of origin. I do not approve of someone fetching the diamonds and bringing them here so I can certify them,” Ndamba said.
Few Kimberley Controls
The efforts have done little to curb profiteering.
Cameroon was admitted as a member of the Kimberley Process in 2012 and reported the next year annual production of 2,721 carats in rough diamonds, and about 3,400 carats in 2014. And yet the number of falsified rough diamond certificates seized far outpaces its annual production, according to International Peace Information Service (IPIS), an Antwerp based research institute that specializes in natural resources.
“Forged Cameroonian Kimberley Process certificates presented abroad indicate the volume of illegal exports is significant. In 2013, the Kimberley Process Secretariat in Cameroon confirmed that a total of 6,722 carats worth of would-be Cameroonian KP certificates presented abroad were counterfeit. With a potential Cameroonian diamond production of only 5,000 carats, these almost certainly include Central African diamonds,” IPIS said in its report, Diamonds in the Central African Republic.
Most of the fake certificates and untaxed diamonds pass through the Douala International Airport, Cameroon’s economic hub. Three years after Cameroon signed the accord pledging to export diamonds that were conflict free, its airport lacked a Kimberley Process control office, despite promises from the Cameroon government and a track record of the airport’s use as a smuggling center. In one extreme example of fraudulent export, a parcel of 281,869 carats with a certificate of origin from Cameroon as well as a fake KP certificate left through Douala Airport at the end of 2009, according to the IPIS report.
Diamond operators interviewed for this investigation said Central African blood diamonds transported through Cameroon land in India, Belgium and the United Arab Emirates – global hubs for the international diamond trade.
Diamonds are small, have high value and it is difficult to tell where they originate. Add to this the impulse toward corruption, laissez-faire governance and the ease with which the Kimberley Process can be and circumvented – and the result is a constant stream of blood diamonds entering the international market. Aware that certification was at risk of becoming little more than a salve for the Western buyer’s conscience, the human rights NGO Global Witness in 2011 withdrew its support from the Kimberly Process, calling it an “outdated mechanism”
“The sad truth is that most consumers still cannot be certain of the origin of their diamonds, nor whether they are financing armed violence or repressive regimes,” said Charmian Gooch, founding director of Global Witness.
This story was co-funded and produced by 100Reporters and the African Network of Centers for Investigative Reporting, with assistance from the Open Society West Africa.
Photo Credits:
Lead Photo: Issa Bouba, an official government collector who certifies the origin of gemstones and promised to handle diamonds from the Central African Republic, holds raw diamonds in the palm of his hand, Gbitti, Cameroon. Photo by Christian Locka.
Former Seleka soldier drives to a village in the Central African Republic, about 16 miles from Bambari, where residents say anti balaka Christian militia attacked a mosque. May 10, 2014. Photo by Siegfried Modola/Reuters.
Prospector pans for gold and diamonds near the town of Gaga in the Central African Republic. April 6, 2014. Photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters.
Video: Adam Abba, a diamond collector in Kentzou, Cameroon, handles gemstones mined from western regions of the Central African Republic, which are barred from international trade under the Kimberley Process. Video by Christian Locka, editing by Aishvarya Kavi.
Prospector pans for gold and diamonds near the town of Gaga in the Central African Republic. April 6, 2014. Photo by Goran Tomasevic/Reuters.
Young woman pans for diamonds in a pit dug in Gbitti, Cameroon. Photo by Christian Locka.
Christian Locka
The curse of diamond funded violence in CAR clearly exposes the how easy it is to circumvent the Kimberley Process regulations. Despite the spin from the World Diamond Council and the jewellery industry the diamond market remains heavily contaminated with blood diamonds that fund both rebel groups and rogue regimes guilty of gross human rights violations.
The millions of dollars of illegal diamonds that fund violence and bloodshed in CAR is dwarfed by the billions of dollars of legal blood diamonds that fund rogue regimes in Israel, Angola and Zimbabwe. Loopholes in the Kimberley Process allow diamonds that generate revenue for government forces guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity to legally enter the market.
The World Diamond Council refuses to broaden the existing narrow definition of a “conflict diamond” which is restricted to rough diamond that fund violence by rebel groups against legitimate governments. The jewellery industry promotes a bogus System of Warranties that allows sellers to self-certify diamonds are conflict-free even though they generate revenue used to fund grievous human rights violations by government forces.
The Kimberley Process provides a cloak which conceals billions of dollars of blood diamonds that fund murder, torture, rape, mutilation and corruption by government forces.
In 2015, when Angola chaired the Kimberley Process, authorities there prosecuted the award-winning journalist and author Rafael Marques de Morais for exposing hundreds of examples of human rights violations by government forces associated with the diamond industry in Angola.
The linkage between corruption and human rights violations by government forces associated with the diamond industry in Zimbabwe has been well documented. Diamonds from Zimbabwe are all KP certified and freely and legally enter the market.
Some of the most serious diamond-funded human rights violations occur in Palestine where Israeli forces are funded to a very significant degree by revenue from the diamond industry. In 2014 diamonds worth over $21billion gross ($11.5bn net) account for 30% of Israel’s manufacturing exports. Revenue from the Israeli diamond industry funds a nuclear armed apartheid regime that continues to illegally occupy Palestinian territory in the West Bank and Gaza and engages in daily violations of Palestinian human rights including murder, home demolitions, detention without trial of over 700 including children as young as 12. In 2014 Israel’s diamond-funded forces killed over 2200 people in Gaza, mainly civilians, including over 500 children.
Diamond-funded violence in CAR represents only a fraction of a far bigger problem. The trade in legal blood diamonds generates billions of dollars for brutal regimes that enforce their will upon defenseless populations. Victims of the blood diamond trade are denied the legal and political protections which the unwitting buyers of blood diamonds in the more developed world take for granted.