The Minority in Parliament has accused two top functionaries of the Akufo-Addo administration of engaging in illegal small-scale mining popularly known as galamsey despite the ban on the practice.
According to Minority spokesperson on Mines and Energy, Adams Mutawakilu, the Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission, Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie also known as Sir John and Ashanti Regional Chairman of the NPP, Bernard Antwi Boasiako, a.k.a Wontumi, are deeply involved in galamsey in Jacobu in the Ashanti Region.
Addressing the media on Tuesday, the Damongo MP also accused the President of covering up the two officials.
[contextly_sidebar id=”r4pZlDC2qahXKPXXzMMlyKjEHHOWkRA1″]Mutawakilu thus urged the president to immediately order the two officials to abort their operations.
“…The chief of Jakobu came out clearly [to tell me] that the CEO of the forestry commission and Wontumi, chairman of NPP in the Ashanti Region, are engaged in galamsey. It is a fact and a slap on a face of the president. I believe that the president is probably doing a cover up for this people because the information we the minority have is that the CEO of the Forestry Commission, Sir John, uses his office to put sign posts that certain areas are marked for reclamation, the natural fact is that there is serious galamsey going on in there. This is just to let the military not to invade in those places,” he said.
The Damango MP said they believe that despite the fight against illegal small scale mining, success has not been achieved because water bodies in affected areas ought to have been clean by now, but it turns out to be the other way round.
“When the president made the statement that galamsey will be over soon and the minister said until the water bodies are clean they cannot lift the ban, I organized a press conference where I told you that the statement from the minister indicates that galamsey is ongoing. If galamsey was not ongoing, after almost one year after the fight against galamsey, the water bodies should be clean by now because it is not stagnant water, it is running water and so much rain has come. So all things being equal, the water bodies should have been clean by now,” he added.
Wontumi denies
Meanwhile, Chairman Wontumi has rejected the allegations and dared his accusers to provide evidence that he’s complicit in galamsey.
–
By: Godwin A. Allotey & Duke M. Opoku/citinewsroom.com/Ghana
Follow @AlloteyGodwin
