The Minority in Parliament wants an investigation into the galamsey claims made by Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, former Minister of Environment, Science, Technology, and Innovation.
In an interview, the former Minister revealed that some ruling government officials are involved in illegal mining, with the alleged missing excavator story being used against him by his own party and other government officials involved in the galamsey as a weapon to remove him from office.
Dr. Rashid Pelpuo, Parliament’s Ranking Member on the Lands and Forestry Committee, told journalists that the allegations are grave and must be probed.
“We have reports of key government officials being key galamsey operators involved in destroying lands in forest reserves. We wish to call on government to investigate the allegations made by the forever Minister of Environment. It is also our expectation that government must desist from joining illegal immigrants engaged in galamsey because today, most of the lands destroyed have not been restored.”
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng in a recent interview with the state broadcaster GBC alleged that he was ousted from his position to pave the way for the NPP bigwigs to continue their galamsey activities.
He was later relieved of his post over some missing excavators.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng disclosed, “there was an orchestration within the party and the government to get me out and when I left galamsey activities increased. Now things are coming up, and we know those who are doing galamsey even within the party and even people at the Jubilee House.”
Prof. Boateng intimated that the allegations of some 500 missing excavators seized from persons engaged in illegal mining activities in 2020 were untrue and made-up stories by some persons in government to tarnish his reputation in order to chase him out of office.
He disclosed that there were people in government that wanted him out because of his stance on illegal mining activities in the country.
Prof. Boateng disclosed that the very beginning and actions of military personnel deployed to effect the arrest of illegal miners triggered the entire falsehood about him being responsible for the missing excavators at the time.
“The true story is that at the start of Operation Vanguard, the soldiers were supposed to arrest the excavators, but they will go into the forest and remove the control boards of the excavators and come back to report but when they went away, the owners will come with different control boards and move the excavators away.
He further stressed that “there was an orchestration within the party and the government to get me out and when I left galamsey activities increased. Now things are coming up, and we know those who are doing galamsey even within the party and even people at the Jubilee House.”
