New Patriotic Party flagbearer Dr Mahamudu Bawumia engaged the Ghana National Association of Small-Scale Miners on Thursday, August 27, in an effort to forge practical reforms that promote responsible mining, protect the environment, and strengthen local value addition across the country’s extractive sector.
The consultative meeting brought together Dr Bawumia and members of the NPP’s Identifiable Groups Committee on the Extractive Sector to tackle mounting structural and environmental difficulties in mining communities. Small-scale mining supports the livelihoods of thousands of Ghanaians and drives local economic activity, yet the industry continues to struggle with severe environmental degradation and regulatory hurdles.
Consultations With the Ghana National Association of Small-Scale Miners
Held on Thursday, August 27, the dialogue served as a platform for industry stakeholders to voice their concerns and propose policy shifts. The discussions focused directly on balancing economic survival with ecological safety.
In a Facebook post, Dr Bawumia said the discussions focused on the difficulties facing small-scale miners and measures to promote responsible mining while protecting the environment and sustaining livelihoods. We discussed the challenges facing small-scale mining and practical reforms to promote responsible mining, protect the environment, create jobs and strengthen local value addition,
he said. Dr Bawumia emphasized that the ongoing meetings are designed to shape actionable measures, aiming to make small-scale operations both sustainable and productive as noted in his social media statements following the event. The engagement forms part of the NPP’s ongoing consultations with key stakeholders in the extractive sector to gather views that could inform policies and reforms for the industry.
The Scale of Unlicensed Operations and Regulatory Gaps
Speaking on JoyNews’ Newsfile on Saturday, September 20, Political Risk Analyst and Economist Dr Theo Acheampong sounded the alarm over the scale of illegal mining, commonly known as galamsey in Ghana, warning that the country faces a worsening crisis if bold and radical measures are not taken.
Dr Acheampong highlighted alarming figures concerning regulatory compliance, revealing that the vast majority of small-scale mining operations are unregulated. “70% of all small-scale mining activities are not licensed, and even amongst those that are licensed, we are not even too sure of the mining practices that they are using, and that is further adding to or compounding the scale of the problem,” he cautioned. According to him, the issue has persisted for years due to weak regulatory oversight and poor enforcement. So we begin to see quite clearly that we have a major problem on our hands, and this is not something just today,
he noted. Dr Acheampong insisted that drastic action is now required, saying, We need to do something different; we need to do something we may call radical.
Proposing a more sustainable path, Dr Acheampong called for urgent reforms in Ghana’s mining laws, starting with the repeal of legislative instrument 2462.
Evaluating Past Security Sweeps Versus Long-Term Reform
Past government interventions to curb illegal mining have relied heavily on militarized sweeps, such as Operation Vanguard and Operation Halt. Rejecting suggestions that declaring a state of emergency is the right solution, Dr Acheampong pointed to the failures of previous militarised interventions: “Where I sort of disagree a little bit is in terms of the state of emergency because we have had similar interventions in the past. Others talk about Operation Vanguard and Operation Halt; we had these militarised sweeps into different mining enclaves and different mining sites. But as soon as the troops leave, as soon as the security forces leave, you then have the miners and the people going back to engage in the same sort of operation.”
“So I think fundamentally, if you impose a state of emergency, that is just going to be a short-term solution. It doesn’t fundamentally address what I call the supply-side issue that is actually driving the menace. Because again, we have done a number of these interventions, and it has not really worked,”
Dr Theo Acheampong, Political Risk Analyst and Economist, via Myjoyonline
