Small scale miners bare teeth at foreigners over invasion of water bodies

The Small Scale Miners Association last Wednesday expressed anger over the invasion of Togolese nationals who are briskly mining gold on Ghana's river bodies.

The association is strongly convinced that the sudden rise in illegal mining on river bodies in the past month indicates how desperate some individuals are to score cheap political points at the expense of the image and reputation of the Small Scale Miners Association.

According to them, the massive influx of these Togolese nationals, coupled with their illegal activities, is part of a larger scheme by some political elements to make the government unpopular ahead of the December elections.

Ghana’s media space has been inundated with discussions about the upsurge in illegal mining activities, causing public outcry with barely three months to the elections.

Further describing the situation as "deliberate," the small scale miners disclosed that these Togolese nationals have been sponsored into the country with the specific task of causing outrage among Ghanaians by ravaging the river bodies.

The association has therefore issued a stern warning to all illegal miners on river bodies to vacate or face their wrath, as they will not sit idly by and allow a few political elements to tarnish their image and business.

A strong task force organized by the association stormed Mankranso in the Ahafo Ano South West district to swoop down on these foreign miners on River Mankran.

The move to clamp down on the illegal foreign miners was led by the Small Scale Miners Association and supported by the Minerals Commission, reinforcing the government’s commitment to fighting against mining of any sort in rivers.

Unfortunately, most of the miners, upon seeing the task force, fled, abandoning their equipment.

Those who were not so lucky and were arrested could not communicate in any Ghanaian local dialect.

According to some locals, these Togolese nationals started this activity about a month ago on River Mankran, much to their dismay, but they could not confront them due to the heavy weapons the miners wielded.