President John Dramani Mahama has instructed the newly commissioned inter-ministerial taskforce on illegal mining to arrest, prosecute and deport foreign nationals involved in illegal mining in the country.
He thus cautioned all persons involved in the trade saying their activities must cease with immediate effect.
“Government is not against small scale mining. Your mandate is to ensure that our laws in the small scale mining are fully enforced. It may include the following: seize equipment of those who fail to comply with the new directives of obtaining or renewing licenses, arrest and prosecute anybody both Ghanaian and non-Ghanaian engaged in illegal small scale mining, deport non-Ghanaians involved, revoke the licenses of Ghanaians who have subleased their concessions to non-Ghanaians against the rules, revoke the licenses of Ghanaians who have engaged the services of non-Ghanaians as miners in the small scale mining sector in ways that are contrary to the rules.”
President Mahama on Tuesday inaugurated an inter-Ministerial taskforce to curb the activities of illegal miners across the country.
The taskforce is made of the Ministers of Defence, Interior, Foreign Affairs, Science and Environment, with the Lands and Natural Resources Minister as the chair.
According to the President the action has been made necessary because of the deadly effects of the activities of illegal miners on the environment.
He called for coordination between the ministries to ensure that the activities of such groups of persons were brought to a halt
“Your task is simple and straight forward. It is to actualize my determination to bring sanity into the mining sector including my pledge to ensure that the small scale mining sector is reserved for Ghanaians as stated by law.
“You are being put together to work and coordinate the various efforts because the activities of the illegal small scale mining breeds consequences that are multi-faceted and cut across sectors.”
President Mahama added: “Small scale mining has become a security threat and a danger to the environment and we need to deal with it in a more systematic manner than we have done in the past.
Citifmonline
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