President John Dramani Mahama has said he will not hesitate to declare a state of emergency on illegal mining if the National Security Council advises him to do so.
Speaking during a dialogue with Civil Society Organisations on illegal mining (galamsey) on Friday, President Mahama said he has the power to declare a state of emergency but acts on the advice of the National Security Council.
“Yes, I have the power to do it. But the President acts on the authority, not only on the authority, on the advice of the National Security Council. And us, at now, this moment, the National Security Council believes that we can win the fight against galamsey without a state of emergency,” he said.
He assured CSOs that he will not hesitate if advised otherwise.
“I want to assure you that the day they advise me otherwise, that, boss, now we need a state of emergency, I will not hesitate in declaring a state of emergency. But we do still think that we have the powers to be able to win this fight,” he added.
The President said as more troops are deployed and more resources applied to the fight, government will gradually begin to win.
President Mahama announced that government will shift strategy to target kingpins running illegal mining operations rather than foot soldiers. He said most of the 1,400 people arrested are young youth looking for livelihoods.
“I like that somebody raised that, what are we doing to the kingpins? Because most of those 1,400 who have been arrested are young youth who are looking for something to be able to look after themselves. And we’ll prosecute them, we’ll imprison them. But those who run those operations are the ones that we must be arresting and imprisoning, not these little boys,” he said.
The President noted that the current minimum sentence for illegal mining is five to 15 years.
“So we’ll catch these boys, and we’ll feed them for five years, look after them for five years, and discharge them. But like I’m saying, maybe we can look rather for the kingpins and deal with them in a major way so that we are able to get something on this whole thing,” he stated.
President Mahama cited best practices from other countries facing similar challenges with illegal mining. He noted that Ghana is not alone in dealing with the menace.
“The high gold price is pushing a lot of people into gold especially, gold mining. So if you go to Peru, you go to Chile, you go to Zambia, you go to South Africa. South Africa, there have been some old pits that people have gone into and there’s violence, people have died, you know, all kinds of things are happening,” he said.
He emphasized that Chile has successfully formalized 90 percent of its small-scale gold mining sector.
“If you look at Chile, for instance, they’ve been able to formalize 90 percent of their small-scale gold mining. It means 90 percent they were in the same situation as us. But today 90 percent of their small-scale mining is formalized. And they have control of it, they inspect, they make sure that they’re doing the right thing. We can also achieve that,” he stated.
The President said even though Ghana is not alone facing the menace, the country can use best practices from Chile and other countries to formalize the small-scale mining sector and take control of it.
He told the CSOs that the dialogue is the first of many to update them on progress in the fight against illegal mining.
“This is not going to be the last. We’ll hold this dialogue to update you on the progress that we’re making in the fight against illegal mining,” he said.
President Mahama assured the CSOs that he personally has no interest in galamsey continuing.
“We have nothing to hide. I don’t gain anything from galamsey. I am not personally involved in galamsey. And I have no interest in it continuing. And so, you can be sure that we’re all on the same side and we’ll continue to do this work,” he added.
Richard Aniagyei, ISD
