There is a constantly growing list of appointees and members of the ruling party reported engaged in illegal mining, the latest name to drop is Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, aka “Sir John”, the Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission.
A group called the Concerned Small Scale Miners Union of Ghana (CSSMUG) fingered Sir John for being one of the illegal mining (Galamsey) kingpins and have called for his immediate arrest. They want him picked up alongside the Ashanti Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Bernard Antwi Boasiako.
Some chiefs in the Amansie Central District in the Ashanti Region have reportedly complained about the illegal mining activities in a forest reserve called Apampram Forest Reserve.
“We have ample evidence to prove that the very public officer into whose care the nation’s forests have been entrusted is neck-deep in ravaging the bellies of some of the most virgin of forest reserves for gold, under the guise of ‘reclamation’,” a statement released by CSSMUG read.
“Our long-held stance has been vindicated by the chiefs of the Amansie Traditional Area in the Ashanti region who have openly accused Sir John and no mean a person than the Ashanti Regional Chairman of the ruling NPP, Bernard Antwi Boasiako alias ‘Chairman Wontumi’ of engaging in galamsey deep inside the Apampram Forest Reserve in the Amansie Central District.”
The group have also fingered the Akufo Addo administration for complicity in the notorious Galamsey operations, “The government’s deafening silence over this matter weeks after the chiefs’ public outburst, apart from being surprising also suggests to us that it is not committed to the fight against illegal mining as it wants the world to believe,” the statement read.
Indeed, the maverick member of the party and Member of Parliament of the NPP from Assin North, Kennedy Agyapong in a recent interview with Net 2 Television confirmed that several Ministers, NPP Politicians and appointees, were neck-deep in Galamsey operations.
On Wednesday, Whatsup News intercepted a secret video recording exposing the ruling party as being funded by the Galamsey activities of its appointees and party members.
The damning video recording revealed that the ruling party was directly being funded by these illegal miners. The name of the party’s current General Secretary, John Boadu also popped up as one of the Galamsey kingpins.
The video reportedly recorded in the office of Prof Frimpong Boateng, the Minister of Environment and the Chairman of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining (IMCIM), revealed the IMCIM Chairman being quizzed for bypassing some party bigwigs in the distribution of seized mining excavators for mining in their illegal concessions.
Prof. Frimpong Boateng himself have been widely fingered for being a mastermind behind illegal mining operations in Ghana. Last year, his secretary, Charles Bissue was secretly captured facilitating Galamsey activities in return for cash.
A supposed Galamsey cartel is said to be prowling the corridors of the Jubilee House, despite President Akufo Addo’s initial promise to put his presidency on the line in the fight against illegal mining.
Large-scale Illegal Mining operations championed by Chinese nationals in collaboration with their Ghanaian co-conspirators have devastated countless river bodies and forest reverse in almost all regions in Ghana.