Illegal mining activity is robbing children of a brighter future in education in some parts of the Upper East Region.
TV3's Narkwor Kwabla reports that in one of three communities she visited, no child had completed Junior High School. A handful of children are in school, while majority work with their parents in illegal mining (galamsey) pits.
On the dawn of a new day, the community is deeply engaged in mining activities. The community is made up of squatter miners who have no license to be in the business.
But many people are involved in the illegal gold mining activity, with children sent underground to dig the rocks looking for gold. The men sieve through, with years of experience they know quite well, which rock has gold.
The women pound the rocks into powder before it is washed with the mercury. The children in the community have all dropped out of school, after they were lured with high pay at the end of the day, which they spend on motorbikes.
Overseas, one of the communities in the area, is also deeply involved in the illegal gold mining activity. At the time of our visit, the women were on their way to the mining sites in Nagurama.
They were unaware education offers their children the opportunity and confidence to build a future for themselves, their families and their communities.
In Nagurama, the school is not in the centre of the town yet empty. From primary 1 to 5, only 12 showed up in school. No primary one and 5 pupil showed up.
The only teacher Ibrahim Seidu has combined 3 classes, primary 2, 3 and 4 to teach.
"They are with their parents working with them in the farm. Some are also engaged in galamsey activities whereas others are at home doing nothing" the teacher lamented.
The children hang around the school unperturbed, while, two classrooms are empty. The school is not in the best of shape though, dilapidated with no chairs and books even though this school is expected to be benefiting under the free compulsory universal basic education, Fcube programme.
TV3 gathered that no one in the village has completed Junior High School. Most of the young ones do not continue after they complete class five.
The next junior high school is several kilometers away and unattractive to them because of the distance.
The teachers say efforts to get parents to understand that education will enable the community reduce poverty by engaging in better paying jobs has fallen on deaf ears.
The lives of these innocent children are clearly wasting away.
