The President of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), Mr Affail Monney, has said journalists at the forefront of the anti-galamsey fight got frustrated by the seeming unwillingness of the law enforcement bodies to crack the whip even after the media had risked it all to expose some of the illegal small-scale mining culprits.
“A naked truth is better than well-dressed lies”, he quoted to underpin his concession that: “The naked truth is that we slackened in the fight against galamsey and as an insider, I can say that we were frustrated by the lack of resolve or the will of our law enforcement community, by our legal regime, to deal drastically with the perpetrators of illegal mining”.
“We are human”, Mr Monney told Class91.3FM’s Eugene Bawelle on current affairs programme ‘The Watchdog’ on Saturday, 17 April 2021.
“Look at what Anas did”, he complained, adding: “After doing all the exposés, after journalists risking their lives, putting their lives on the line to do stories exposing the perpetrators of galamsey, some will be arrested, some will not even be arrested”.
“So, at a point, we felt we were fighting a losing battle and all the advocacy virtually came to nought”, he said.
President Nana Akufo-Addo recently said his fight against galamsey will not be based on hearsay and unsubstantiated allegations.
At a national dialogue on small-scale mining organised by the Minister of Land and Natural Resources in Accra on Wednesday, 14 April 2021, President Akufo-Addo, who has been criticised in the past for letting some of his appointees, who have been accused of aiding and abetting galamsey activities go scot-free, said he will only act on such whistle-blowing based on evidence.
“I’m determined to enforce the laws of illegal mining no matter the subject – high or low”, the President said.
“I’ll, however, not act on hearsay or mere allegations without more”, he noted.
However, he added: “I will not hesitate to act, though, when the evidence is hard before the police and I would do so irrespective of the standing of the person or persons involved”.
That, according to him, “is the true meaning of equality before the law”.
Mr Akufo-Addo also said: “I want to build on the modest progress made in my first term”.
“I want to learn from our shortcomings and receive productive input from this forum for purposes of enhancing the regulation of the sector”, he noted.
He said: “Out of this consultative dialogue, I hope we’ll build a national consensus around a national policy on small-scale mining”.
Hopefully, he noted, “at the end of the day, we should be able to build a broad-based national consensus around the necessity to stamp out the menace of illegal small-scale mining and the need to support and grow a responsible small-scale mining”.
Source:Classfmonline.com
