In furtherance of the objectives of decentralizing the regulation of mining activities in the country, the Deputy Minister of Lands and Natural Resources in charge of Mining, Hon. George Mireku Duker is inaugurating Mining Committees across all Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies in the country.

On Wednesday, February 16, 2022, Hon. George Mireku Duker outdoors the Wassa East District Mining Committee in the Western Region.

Hon. Mireku Duker said the committee has been mandated to promote responsible, viable, and safer mining methods.

The Deputy Minister professed his belief in the competence and experience of the members of the committee to deliver on their mandate.

He empowered the committee members to act in accordance with the dictates of the law and not show any form of compromise or bias.

“The composition is rich and I believe you are determined to believe that on your mandate, confidence is so high and I believed you’ll go by the tenet that establishes the committee”, he stated.

“If we are the leading gold producers in Africa then we must have something to show the people of Ghana and that is why the President is so committed to ensuring that whatever we generated from the mining space must be used for the benefit of the citizenry”, he added.

“We have commissioned this committee to ensure that more of the small-scale mining sector is streamlined and beneficial to the people of this district and Ghana as a whole. We want to use gold and our resource to develop the country,” he said.

The Tarkwa Nsuaem lawmaker said the government intends to use the Community Mining Scheme (CMS) to grow Ghanaian representation in the mining space and support them to grow into big mining firms.

He, however, cautioned that these commendable ideas of government would be fruitless if activities such as gold smuggling and illegal mining are not stopped.

He, therefore, urged Ghanaians to help the government tackle the menace that is threatening the growth of the mining sector.

The Chairman of the Committee, Hon. Emmanuel Boakye who also doubles as the Chief Executive of Wassa East, in his acceptance speech said he is grateful to the government for the honor done him and other members of the committee and promised to “work assiduously to ensure that sanity prevails as far as community mining is concerned”.

Other members of the committee are Nana Kwabena Ampomah, Jones Benjamin Tawiah, Moses Kpebu, Isaac Nwimbele and Bright Arko.

Story by:Kwaku Stephen