24,000 acres of forest reserve in Upper Denkyira exhausted by Chinese "galamseyers"

General News of Wednesday, February 20, 2019

Source: goldstreetbusiness.com

2019-02-20

24,000 acres of forest reserve in Diaso in the central Denkyira West Upper District were deveminated by illegal Chinese miners.

A working group found illegal miners in the Aminase Forest Reserve, arresting the 12 Chinese nationals and their only Ghanaian counterpart on site, as well as 24 localized excavation machines.

The activities of these miners and other illegal people are depleting the forest reserve, but thanks to the surveillance and deployment of drones, their harmful activities have become empty.

Despite the government's ban on illegally operating small-scale mining and the destruction of the Aminase Forest Reserve, the Tonton Forest Reserve, also located in Denkyira Upper District, in the central region, was also attacked by the Chinese "galamseyers".

Chiefs and people say that they only wake up when trucks and excavators move into the reserve with raging information among the natives of Upper Denkyira West District. State officials and politicians are complicit in the illegal mining activities (galamsey) of Chinese rapists.

It appeared that Canada and Ghana (C & G) Alaska Mining Company had a mining license to prospect for gold, but their indiscriminate destruction was irresponsible and unacceptable.

Head of the government interdepartmental working group against Galamsey, Francis Asibi-Abu was stunned by the destruction and national security; local and foreign illegal miners would be prepared for prosecution.

According to Mr. Asibi-Abu, reports suggest that the Alaska Mining Company had operated in the reserve for seven years without a designated license, with the exception of prospecting.

On Saturday, February 16, 2019, the Interministerial Committee for Combating Illegal Mines and Artisbad Miners conducted a guided tour of the Aminase Forest Reserve, which showed timber felled, trees felled, plans for Polluted water and open pits. He added that arrested Chinese nationals had been handed over to the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) for further action.

The government should now recover the destroyed and abandoned lands while educating the inhabitants to avoid settling in the exposed lands due to health problems. The task force also demolished wooden structures erected by these Chinese "galamseyers" in the forest they used for housing.

Regulatory agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Forest Commission of Ghana, the Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation and Ghana Minerals Commission, were all examined for not choosing to monitor the destructive practices of Alaska Mining up to the forest reserve. had been seriously injured, disrupting the region's ecosystem while damaging valuable wood species and causing potential financial loss.