Dr Kenneth Ashigbey, the Convener of the Media Coalition Against Galamsey, has said they cannot give up on the fight against illegal mining (galamsey).
Dr Ashigbey noted that environmental criminals want them to give up, but we will continue to fight until Ghana cleans its water bodies.
Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express on October 1, Dr Ashigbey stated, “If you see the reports you’re churning out, and you see some of the reports that the EPA has done with some partners, it is telling us that it’s not only the turbidity that is exceeded 98,000 NTU.
But also the fact that what we all feared is what is happening, that we have been ingesting a lot of these pollutants.”
Dr Ashigbey added, “We cannot, you know, give up. We need to fight this. People who are dying, people who are being poisoned, people who are being killed. And so the best we can do is to clutch at any straw that we have to be able to go up”.
“Unfortunately, the environmental criminals involved in this would want us to give up. But the bad news for them is that we are not going to give up, and we are going to continue fighting till we can clean our water bodies.”
He further revealed the civil society organisations have been waiting for President John Dramani Mahama’s invitation to dialogue on galamsey.
He revealed that the CSOs are prepared to demand clarity from President John Mahama on what constitutes success in the galamsey fight.
Dr Kenneth Ashigbey added, “We have been waiting for this invitation, because the coalition had written to His Excellency, the President, and he had directed that we meet with the Minister for Lands in the first instance, and he was going to meet us. And we know that the minister had reported back to him, so we were expecting that.”
He added, “The only surprise we got was the fact that over 50 or so people have been invited, you know, and so it was going to really be a very large gathering. And so again, the agenda is not being, and the format of the meeting has not been clearly spelt out.”
“We will take advantage of every opportunity that is given to us to resolve this. But even we are not going into this meeting to go and articulate the problems. We know very clearly what the problems are, and we know His Excellency knows what the problems are.”
“Like we said in our last press release that we gave, we are going to go into this meeting asking His Excellency, the President, what his definition of success is, what he would classify as having successfully executed this particular thing”.
Meanwhile, Franklin Cudjoe, the President of IMANI Africa, has said that President John Mahama’s invitation to civil society organisations (CSOs) to a dialogue on galamsey is just a meet and greet.
The IMANI president criticised the Mahama government’s over-reliance on dialogues.
According to Franklin Cudjoe, John Mahama, in opposition campaign for more than 12 months, so he knows the problem of the galamsey menace.
Mr Cudjoe noted that President Mahama, in power, has already made his stance that his government is not in a hurry to declare a state of emergency on galamsey.
Speaking in an interview on Eyewitness News on Tuesday, September 30, Mr Cudjoe stated, “Frankly, apart from esprit de corps, as in gathering and meeting on this matter. I don’t know the takeaway from this meeting. Maybe the President wants to hear from us directly, face to face.
I don’t understand the meeting; whatever it is, it’s an opportunity to meet him head-on and say ‘look, this is essential and must be dealt with and some assurances that it will be done,” he said.
Franklin Cudjoe added, “The president campaigned for close to 12 months or more on this issue, so he knows. The Presidency has made its stance known. They are not in a hurry to declare a state of emergency”.
“The measures we have to put in place are to secure the hotspots simultaneously. Those properly registered acquire proper licences to do their work, and those who don’t have licences will be dealt with.
“The meeting is a meet and greet, so far as I’m concerned. We will have to hold the President to account. We need to give ourselves timelines, give ourselves KPIs. If the year ends and we don’t see anything on galamsey, it will be ‘butubutu’ [a problem],” he warned.
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