Political analyst, a historian and an advocate against illegal mining Emmanuel Mensah Boamah has said the fight against galamsey was not real.
He has described the approach to the fight against galamsey as “childish” and “financial loss to the state”.
Speaking on GhanAkoma evening political show on Akoma 87.9FM in Kumasi with Aduanaba Kofi Asante Ennin, Mr Boamah wants the president to admit he failed in the fight against illegal mining.
“This Galamsey fight is the biggest environmental scam in Sub Saharan Africa…it is not the illegality of it but the collection of the problem also became an avenue for people to rob the state and also rob the people,” he said.
His comment comes after Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng report on the fight in the country.
Contributing to discussions on the Akoma 87.9FM evening political show, Emmanuel Mensah Boamah pointed out that the seizure of excavators made the fight problematic.
He believes that government cannot solve the galamsey issue.
He blamed President Nana Akufo-Addo on his inability to punish offenders especially those in his government.
According to him, Ghana has gone backwards and nobody should come and do politics with the galamsey fight.
“The galamsey fight is going from bad to worse. We have also taken a lot of state funds to go from bad to worse and I don’t think people must walk free, people must be punished because this is not a political party’s assets it is a country asset and if you look at the whole thing did we actually interrogate this illegality and put up a proper plan for it before we started the fight or because we wanted to win some political points so we are the one going to stop the illegality?” he stated.
He stressed that the fight has failed largely because people in the political space has made it a campaign issue.
“People have decided to choose and pick their messages depending on where they find themselves. In opposition they are friends to the people in the industry and in government they want to fight them. That approach has been the bane of our inability to stop the illegality.”
By Benjamin Aidoo|Akoma FM|3news.com|Ghana