Some residents of Tindonmolgo in the Upper East region has called on the Upper East regional minister to disband Galamsey Grinding Mills in their community.
According to them, the presence of these grinding mills and the activities of the illegal miners poses a health threat to members of the community especially residents who stay close to these grinding mills.
“In line with the President’s decision to close down all illegal gold mining activities in the country, we the youth of Tindonmolgo wish to bring to the attention of the regional minister to disband illegal galamsey grinding mill activities going on in our community which poses a lot of health risk to we the residents of Tindonmolgo.”
Apart from the health risk that the activities of these Galamsey grinding mills pose to the people, the resident mentioned that owners of these illegal galamsey grinding mills engage children of school going age in either the extracting of gold from the grindstones or fetching pebbles into the grinding mill machines; a situation they described as alarming considering the number of who engage in these activities instead of going to school.
Residents also complained about the increase in social vices since the inception of the grinding mills has invited people from far and near to the community.
“Since the inception of these illegal galamsey activities in the community, social vices such as stealing, robbery, rape, teenage pregnancies and the like have been on the rise. We now live in fear as there is no day that passes by without a report on these social vices.”
The residents gave the regional minister a two-week ultimatum to disband the activities of the illegal gold grinding mills or face their wrath.
By: Offei-Akoto Ayeh/a1radioonline.com/Ghana
