The Communications Director of the 2024 Bawumia campaign, Dennis Miracles Aboagye, has said he is sometimes tempted to make a mockery of how the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) is handling the issue of illegal mining in the country.
According to him, the NDC, while in opposition, assumed that addressing illegal mining was a simple task and refused to heed the warnings and explanations given by the then-governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration.
“Sometimes when I wake up and I see galamsey issues and the way this government is struggling with it, I feel like let us just laugh at them because we told them and they knew what we were saying was right.”
He explained that, before the 2024 election, the then-opposition NDC made promises that gave hope to illegal miners, despite being cautioned against doing so.
Mr Aboagye claimed that senior figures within the NDC, including President John Mahama in 2024, promised to open the floodgates for illegal mining to continue, under the guise of creating jobs.
“We told them that it is wrong for them to go and stand on a campaign trail as a presidential candidate and tell the people that ‘I don’t see the reason why the NPP would come and arrest them, people in the pit and that when I come to the office I will release you all the galamseyers’, that is what he (John Mahama) said, ” he claimed.
Speaking on the politicisation of the menace, he argued that the NDC is doing very little, and stressed that the government must take the right steps to bring the practice to an end.
He emphasised that the act would not end unless it is depoliticised, stating, “Until we depoliticise galamsey, no matter the structures put in place, it will not work.”
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