{"id":349366,"date":"2017-08-30T15:51:54","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T15:51:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=349366"},"modified":"2017-11-10T12:35:56","modified_gmt":"2017-11-10T12:35:56","slug":"29-galamseyers-fined-ghc15m-over-atewa-forest-mining","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/08\/29-galamseyers-fined-ghc15m-over-atewa-forest-mining\/","title":{"rendered":"29 &#8216;galamseyers&#8217; fined GHc15m over Atewa forest mining"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A Koforidua Circuit Court has found guilty some 29 foreigners who invaded and mined in the Atewa Forest Reserve.<\/p>\n<p>They, together, are to cough up a little over GHc15 million or serve a three-year jail term.<\/p>\n<p>The 29 were rounded up on January 26, 2017 by a joint Military Police and Forestry Task-force, led by Palmer Aikins Amponsah, the Forest Range Manager in the Atewa Forest Reserve, where the foreigners had camped and were mining.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-349381 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-4.jpg\" alt=\"atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-4\" width=\"712\" height=\"400\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Presiding judge, Her Honour, Ms Mercy Adei Kotei, convicted three accused Ghanaian accomplices; \u00a0Abdulai Umaru, Zibo Alidu and Haruna Mumuni, with conspiracy to mine without license, and were asked to pay a fine of 2,500 penalty units each (GHc30, 000.00) or in default serve 3 years imprisonment.<\/p>\n<p>The judge said\u00a0she handed them the\u00a0sentence because the court had no previous criminal records against them.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-349377 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-1.jpg\" alt=\"atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-1\" width=\"712\" height=\"400\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The other 26 accused persons who were all foreigners were convicted of conspiracy to mine without license, and mining without license as against Ghana&#8217;s mining laws, and were also asked pay a fine of 50,000 penalty units each (GHC 600,000.00) or in default serve 5 years imprisonment.<\/p>\n<p>A third count of Trespassing was however dismissed by the court with the judge stating that the prosecution failed to prove that the accused persons indeed trespassed.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with <strong>Citi News<\/strong>,\u00a0the counsel for the accused persons, Dolla Jabah Mensah, said they were disappointed with the ruling.<\/p>\n<p>He said &#8220;I&#8217;m obviously disappointed with the judgement because prosecution failed to prove my clients were illegally mining.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He also said &#8220;the sentence is very harsh so we will take our time to study the judgement and advice our clients as to the next step to take.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-349376 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-5.jpg\" alt=\"atewa-forest-reserve-illegal-miners-5\" width=\"768\" height=\"431\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Their woes come on the heels of a war the government of Ghana has waged on illegal mining in the country.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Operation Vanguard arrests over 90 more illegal miners<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>An anti-illegal mining task force formed by government to clamp down on the menace known as Operation Vanguard, has so far arrested <span style=\"color: #666699;\"><a style=\"color: #666699;\" href=\"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/08\/29\/operation-vanguard-arrests-over-90-more-illegal-miners\/\"><strong>183 persons<\/strong><\/a><\/span> who engaged in illegal mining activities across the country.<\/p>\n<p>The miners were arrested in some illegal mining areas in the Ashanti, Eastern and Western Regions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>By: Neil Nii Amatey Kanarku\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Koforidua Circuit Court has found guilty some 29 foreigners who invaded and mined in the Atewa Forest Reserve. They, together, are to cough up a little over GHc15 million or serve a three-year jail term. The 29 were rounded up on January 26, 2017 by a joint Military Police and Forestry Task-force, led by [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11],"tags":[150,3,10696,506],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>29 &#039;galamseyers&#039; fined GHc15m over Atewa forest mining - Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. 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