Senior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has sharply criticised the government\u2019s current posture towards illegal mining, known locally as galamsey, stating that the administration appears more interested in organising and mobilising gold than genuinely halting the destruction of the nation\u2019s environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bentil made his remarks following President John Dramani Mahama\u2019s recent meeting with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) on the ongoing galamsey crisis, where discussions centred on tackling the escalating environmental degradation caused by illegal mining activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u26a0\ufe0f \u201cWe\u2019re Mining Ourselves into Destruction\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Bentil, while government officials publicly commit to combating galamsey, their actions tell a different story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat we are seeing is not an anti-galamsey campaign but a gold mobilisation effort. The focus seems to be on finding ways to collect more gold revenue, not saving our rivers and forests,\u201d Bentil lamented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He argued that the Water Resources Commission, the Forestry Commission, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have all been rendered ineffective due to political interference and lack of enforcement support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOur major rivers \u2014 the Pra, Offin, and Ankobra \u2014 are dying. Yet government machinery looks more like an organised gold-collection system than an environmental protection structure,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \ud83e\udde9 Mahama\u2019s Meeting with CSOs<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n During the meeting, President Mahama called for a \u201ccollective approach\u201d in fighting illegal mining, emphasising that tackling the menace requires the collaboration of CSOs, local communities, and security agencies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, Bentil and other policy analysts view the President\u2019s message as a repeat of political rhetoric, stressing that without decisive enforcement, transparency, and the prosecution of politically connected offenders, the calls for collaboration will amount to little.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ve heard the same speeches under different governments. Yet the destruction is now worse \u2014 turbidity levels have reached crisis levels, and some communities no longer have potable water,\u201d Bentil warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \ud83c\udf0d Environmental Crisis Deepens<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Environmental experts report that turbidity levels in key water bodies have risen more than 500 times the safe limit, endangering both agriculture and public health. The Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) has warned that if the trend continues, the country could face a national water supply emergency within a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, satellite data from the Forestry Commission indicate that more than 35,000 hectares of forest cover have been lost to illegal mining since 2021, particularly in the Western, Eastern, and Ashanti Regions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \ud83d\udd0e Call for Transparency and Enforcement<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Kofi Bentil urged the government to publish all licensed small-scale mining data, enforce environmental laws without fear or favour, and dissolve political cartels benefiting from the illegal mining trade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cGhana doesn\u2019t need more meetings; it needs action,\u201d he stated. \u201cUntil we see excavators seized and politicians arrested for aiding galamsey, this remains business as usual \u2014 not reform.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nsemgh.com Analysis:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bentil\u2019s remarks echo a growing public sentiment that political will, not lack of awareness, is the biggest obstacle in Ghana\u2019s fight against illegal mining. With worsening water pollution, forest destruction, and community displacement, the nation\u2019s gold rush may soon come at the cost of its survival.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Senior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has sharply criticised the government\u2019s current posture towards illegal mining, known locally as galamsey, stating that the administration appears more interested in organising and mobilising gold than genuinely halting the destruction of the nation\u2019s environment. Bentil made his remarks following President John Dramani Mahama\u2019s recent meeting with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":34544,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_post_source_name":"","_post_source_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[43,1],"tags":[1648,147,7455,10387,8440,5099,7396,12326,8116,9196,10427,8057,1094,5556,192,12189,12818,5918,2264,5227,12634,10321,11577,4894,7667,1031,11664,12329,10634,130,9833,12113,7795,67,1137,12111,11698,3805,12896,11167,2278,8383,9205,5655,12778,10329,6258,12474,12077,2802,8869,12177],"class_list":["post-46664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-africa","tag-agriculture","tag-ashanti","tag-campaign","tag-crisis","tag-cso","tag-data","tag-decade","tag-destruction","tag-environment","tag-epa","tag-fear","tag-forestry-commission","tag-galamsey","tag-ghana","tag-ghana-water","tag-ghana-water-company","tag-gold","tag-government","tag-gwcl","tag-health","tag-illegal","tag-illegal-mining","tag-imani","tag-imani-africa","tag-john-dramani-mahama","tag-kofi-bentil","tag-laws","tag-lost","tag-mahama","tag-meeting","tag-menace","tag-mining","tag-nsemgh","tag-nsemgh-com","tag-ohakk-2-consults","tag-politicians","tag-president","tag-president-mahama","tag-prosecution","tag-public-health","tag-revenue","tag-satellite","tag-security","tag-seized","tag-trade","tag-transparency","tag-turbidity","tag-turbidity-levels","tag-vice-president","tag-water","tag-water-bodies"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46664"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46665,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46664\/revisions\/46665"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}