'Akufo-Addo only talks about galamsey, ‘he cannot and will not solve the problem’ – Dr. Norman

Security Analysts Dr. Ishmael Norman has alleged that government is not willing to stop illegal small-scale mining because some persons in it or persons with close ties with it are benefiting from it.

According to him, even though the government has spent a lot of the country’s resources to fight the menace, there has been no progress in stopping

Read full articleit because some powerful people still want it to continue.

“If anyone says the National Security is working, I will say, look the other way because nothing seems to be working. What is the outcome of all the money government has supposedly invested to curb the menace? We do not want to solve problems in this country, we only want to talk about them. These problems actually are cash cows for some people.

“The more such crisis are prolonged, the more people make money out of it. Nobody wants the 'galamsey' problem to go away. Those who have access to power don’t want the problem to go away,” Dr. Norman, who is also the president of the Institute for Security, Disaster and Emergency Studies, is quoted to have said by citinewroom.com.

He also alleged that the government is not willing to stop the menace because of the employment opportunity it gives the youth.

“The ‘galamsey’ problem is a very good excuse for the government. The more government can pack the youth in there, the better it is for them because they do not have to deal with their unemployment. Government doesn’t want to really solve the problem,” he said.

He reiterated that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo does not want to solve the 'galamsey' problem, he will only talk about it but “he cannot and will not solve the problem”.

The government has been heavily criticized by Ghanaians following the re-arrest of Chinese illegal small-scale mining kingpin, Aisha Huang, whom the government had said was deported in 2018.

The government is now saying that Aisha Huang was not deported adding that the ‘galamsey’ ‘queen’ fled from Ghana to avoid prosecution.

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