The government’s spokesperson, Felix Kwakye Ofosu, has indicated that the fight against illegal mining should be a lifelong activity.
According to him, there is no guarantee that people will stop engaging in illegal mining, so the Ghanaian wants to see a government committed to fighting the menace.
He is of the view that timelines in the fight against illegal mining are not imperative in the current circumstances.
“First of all, I am not sure that a timeline is the conversation we should be having. I think it should be a lifelong activity. The point is that we cannot guarantee that people will stop wanting to do galamsey. Every time that somebody plans to do galamsey and actually starts doing it, it is the duty of the state to fight it.
So to the extent that humans are such that they will always want to do something contrary to the law, we must remain eternally vigilant. What matters is that people see demonstrable commitment to fighting it. Such that if you are engaged in galamsey or I am engaged in galamsey we will be stopped by the government and action will be taken. I think that is what people want rather than limiting yourself to say in two months I will fight galamsey,” he told Channel 1 Television in an interview.
The position expressed by Kwakye Ofosu is a shift from his position expressed on the matter while in opposition.
In the past, he was of the view that the galamsey fight persisted just because the New Patriotic Party (NPP) was benefiting from it financially.
He urged the people of Ghana to throw out the NPP if they want galamsey to be whipped out of the country.
