The government plays 'see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil' in the İliç disaster: 'Ministries are passing the buck'

Officials from the Ministry of Labor and Social Security were heard at the İliç Mining Accident Research Commission established in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM). 

The commission convened at 14:00 under the chairmanship of Commission President Atay Uslu.

'MINISTRIES ARE PASSING THE BUCK'

CHP Zonguldak Deputy Deniz Yavuzyılmaz stated that the two ministries that had previously attended the commission did not take responsibility for the heap leach site, saying: "Today you have come, and as the Ministry of Labor, you are saying, 'Issues related to the heap leach site do not fall within our area of responsibility.' Well, which Ministry's area of responsibility does it fall under? Let me list them; could it be the Ministry of Foreign Affairs? Could it be the Ministry of National Education? Unfortunately, this important issue of the heap leach site, which should be at the intersection of the Ministries' jurisdictions, remains unresolved as the Ministries pass the buck to one another," he said. Yavuzyılmaz asked the Ministry of Labor "at what time they were informed about the collapse and in which areas the blasting was carried out." he asked. 

SAADET PARTY'S DOĞAN: NO MINISTRY ACCEPTS THE LEACH SITE

Saadet Party Ankara Deputy Mesut Doğan criticized the Ministry, speaking as follows:

"We have been listening to our ministries for four days now; not a single ministry has come forward regarding the heap leach or the deaths. No one has any responsibility. No one is at fault, no one is to blame, yet we have experienced a major disaster and, as a result, we have lost 9 of our people. Believe me, after listening to three of our ministries, we have all seen dangerous gaps in the legislation. Furthermore, we have witnessed a lack of synchronization between institutions. In addition, we have witnessed major negligence in implementation. We have also all seen and heard that there is a major deficiency in inspections."

Deputy Minister of Labor and Social Security Lütfihak Alpkan responded to the deputies' questions. Stating that they obtained information based on the preliminary investigation report of the disaster, Alpkan said, "When I went there and met with the occupational health and safety experts and managers, they shared similar findings, but since issues such as the amount of solution and project details do not fall within our area of expertise, we cannot say there is a definitive finding here. However, this emerged mostly through the relaying of expert opinions to us, and we also saw it in photos and videos, and we saw it on the field; even if we are not experts, an idea formed regarding the cause of the landslide." 

ALPKAN: IT IS NOT WITHIN OUR SCOPE OF INSPECTION 

In response to the question, "Did you have any findings before the disaster occurred?" Alpkan said, "Before the incident occurred, in December, they went there upon a complaint; we do not have an inspection regarding the heap leach area, it is not our area of activity anyway." he stated.

ARE OPERATIONS CONTINUING ON THE FIELD?

Stating that occupational health and safety experts "determined that there was a problem on the field and requested that the employees there be evacuated and the solution be stopped," he said, "but since such an accident had not yet occurred, there was no notification; that is, there was no notification to AFAD, the district governorship, or outside, to the police, nor to us. After a while, towards noon, the solution is stopped. As far as we understand from the meetings there, however, there are cracks. They also stop the work there and pull back towards the container, but the experts and officials go back there again to determine what the situation is. Furthermore, the activities of the Çiftay company regarding the mine are continuing, and there is already a finding regarding the lack of coordination and communication between them for that day."

'THERE IS A CİMER COMPLAINT FROM A WORKER'

Bekir Aktürk, Head of the Guidance and Inspection Board of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, noted that there was a request from a worker via CİMER regarding the failure to provide personal protective equipment to workers, stating that "hygiene conditions were not met and an inspection was requested."

When asked who gave the order for the workers to return to the collapsed heap leach pile on the day of the incident, Aktürk replied, "Since most of those responsible for the matter are currently in custody, we were unable to direct this question to them."

'ARE WORKERS NOT WORKING IN THAT FIELD?'

Following Aktürk's statement that his ministry does not conduct inspections regarding heap leaching, CHP's Yavuzyılmaz asked, "Are workers not working in that leach field? Are the employees of the private sector company working there not directly under your responsibility and inspection scope regarding occupational health?" This led to a dispute over "time limits" between Yavuzyılmaz and AKP İstanbul Deputy Şengül Karslı.