The New Patriotic Party (NPP), says President John Dramani Mahama must be blamed for the continuous havoc illegal gold miners popularly referred to as galamsey operators, are causing across the country.
The NPP said President Mahama is looking on and allowing the menace to destroy most of the water bodies that serve as source of drinking water for millions of Ghanaians.
Addressing a news conference in Accra on Wednesday, the Director of Communications for the NPP, Nana Akomea, said President John Mahama’s poor management of the crisis has led to the current situation.
“He told you that he would ensure proper governance of our natural resources. Today when you go to the Ghanaian country side, galamsey is destroying the forest, land, farms, cocoa, and rivers. When you go and you see for yourself, if you are not careful you will get a shock, right under the watch of everybody and yet the man said he was going to ensure proper governance of our natural resources,” he added.
Water plants to be closed down
Akomea’s comment comes on the back of the impending closure of three water treatment plants at Barekese, Kyebi and Daboase affected by illegal mining.
Some lands and farms have also been rendered useless due to chemicals used by the illegal miners in extracting gold.
Taskforce can’t police illegal miners’ everyday
Despite the existence of an Inter-Ministerial task-force to combat the illegal mining, the Minister for Environment, Science and Technology, Mahama Ayariga, has held that the inter-Ministerial team could not be expected to be “running around every day, everywhere. Every piece of land falls within a district and so the MMDAs must take that responsibility.”
“When you have large numbers at one location all digging, using earth moving equipment, at that stage, a district police post cannot tell me that they cannot stop that. You are trained to be able to stop that so if you cannot stop that then we are all in trouble,” he said.
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By: Godwin A. Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana
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