Anti-mining Gbane Assemblyman arrested by Upper East Police

Mr. Bismark Azumah, Assemblyman for Gbane, was on Tuesday detained by the Upper East Regional Police Command in Bolgatanga for alleged extortion but locals say he was arrested for his incessant criticism of the modus operandi of Chinese miners in the area.

Mr Azumah was given police enquiry bail on the morning of Thursday, September 13, 2012, spending nearly 48 hours in police detention.

The Ghana News Agency (GNA) gathered from the arrested assemblyman’s close confidants that his arrest was sparked by an interview he granted to the GNA in which he raised concerns about the activities of Chinese miners in the district which have been ignored by the Assembly.

However, the Police are alleged to have charged him for using the name of the Police administration in the district to extort monies from small-scale miners.

The Chinese miners’ activities have brought about uneasiness and conflicts as a result of widespread dispossession of land and the sudden change in the means of livelihood among community members.

The Assembly and the Traditional authorities in the Talensi area have also been drawn into the spiraling conflict.

Mr. Azumah who later spoke to the GNA, said that the Chinese miners were practically and deeply involved in large scale mining, using shafts and bigger mining equipment, but have created the impression that they were providing technical services.

“How can the so called service providers engage in physical mining, destroying the environment at the expense of the poor villagers whereas government sits unconcerned.”

When the GNA contacted the Municipal Commander of Police, Chief Superintendent Christian Bortsr, he indicated that the suspect had conceded to the extortion charges preferred against him, adding that he had continuously collected monies from the indigenes in the community by imposing a development tax system and issuing receipts.

He said when Mr. Azumah was arrest, an amount of GH¢1,200 and 60 bags of stones suspected to be gold bearing ores were retrieved from him and deposited at the Municipal Police Command as exhibits.

He explained that there were persistent reports of corruption, harassment, disrespect for authority and extortion from community members against Mr. Azumah.

According to him, the suspect had sent some hooligans and unemployed youth to riot against the traditional authorities and subsequently attempted to de-skin the clan head in Gbane.

Mr. Azumah reacting to these allegations leveled against him by the Police said the Talensi Traditional Council hoping to bring development to the mining area at a meeting constituted a development committee of which he was part and later made its chairman.

He said he was charged by the committee to levy all groups engaged in mining to pay some form of royalties and any such money paid or gold dust received, were documented and therefore denied any claim by the Police that he had imposed a tax regime on the community.

He conceded that he was one of the community members who spoke against the Chinese Company’s operations in the area and said the Police including some high ranking people in the region were fanning those allegations against him with the hope that he would stop pursuing the truth.

Mr. Azumah called on the government to impress on the Minerals Commission to make its report on mining in the area available to the community for the necessary recommendations to be implemented.

He called for a full-scale external investigation into the disturbances in the Gbane community.