You can't fight galamsey when your regional chairman is complicit – Collins Dauda to govt

A former Lands and Natural Resources Minister, Collins Dauda, has reiterated that the fight against illegal mining popularly known as ‘galamsey’ was one that required government to show more commitment.

According to him, the current government continued to suffer setbacks in the fight because its top executives at the constituency and regional levels were complicit in the act.

GhanaWeb monitored comments he had on Thursday in an interview with Joy FM on the sidelines of the illegal mining conference organized by the sector ministry.

“The problem of illegal mining is a difficult one for government to solve. I say so because the players involved in illegal mining are very influential. If you are a government and you want to deal with illegal mining activities and you have your regional chairman deeply involved in it.

“You have your constituency chairman deeply involved in it, it will be difficult sometimes to call your regional chairman to order. Particularly if that regional chairman is so influential, that is the angle I am coming from.”

Even though he did not mention any specific names of the complicit officials, in the past the ruling New Patriotic Party’s Ashanti Regional chairman has been accused of involvement in galamsey, a charge he has denied flatly.

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo stressed the need for a non-partisan effort to fight the activities of galamsey operators when he addressed the two-day summit that took place in Accra.

Minister Samuel Abu Jinapor read a communiqué that stakeholders put together at the end of the summit among others pledging robust measures to curb galamsey but a number of experts warned that unless there is a drastic change, this summit risked being another talk shop.

Dauda stressed the gravity of the galamsey menace stating that it had become so bad, farmers were willing to give their land out for mining.

“… if farmers now don’t find value for keeping their cocoa farms, for keeping their lands, but they find value in giving their lands out to galamsey operators, take monies from them, invest such money in other commercial ventures then we are in trouble.

“In this our situation it is rather the farmer and the land owner who is rather promoting it, that is where the challenge is,” he added.