By Michael Foli Jackidy, GNA
Ho (V/R), Sept. 1, GNA – Mr Makafui Kofi Woanyah, Volta Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has raised alarm over the escalating human, environmental and economic consequences of illegal mining, saying “the human cost is now counted in bodies” as more lives are lost and many others remain at risk.
He said the government’s alleged failure or refusal to decisively address illegal mining, popularly known as galamsey, continued to expose young people and communities to hazardous and unregulated environments, with some paying the ultimate price with their lives.
Addressing a press conference in Ho on Tuesday, Mr Woanyah cited the recent deaths in the Ashanti Region, where, according to him, Dr Frank Amoakohene, the Ashanti Regional Minister, had confirmed that at least 23 people died after falling into abandoned illegal mining pits, including 11 children.
He said 19 bodies had been recovered, while four people remained missing, describing the abandoned, uncovered and unfenced mining pits as a serious threat to communities, particularly children.
“Eleven children. Think about that for a moment. Eleven children whose entire futures were cut short,” he said, arguing that the deaths were preventable and linked to the environmental destruction caused by illegal mining.
Mr Woanyah said the consequences of galamsey went beyond abandoned pits, pointing to the alleged exposure of communities to mercury, lead and other chemicals used in mining activities.
He said such chemicals posed risks to water bodies, farmlands, food and human health, stressing that innocent people who had never participated in illegal mining could still suffer the consequences through contaminated water, food and air.
Mr Woanyah said the Volta Region could not afford to regard the illegal mining crisis as a problem affecting only other parts of the country, warning that tributaries feeding the Volta Lake were increasingly vulnerable to pollution.
He cited concerns raised by environmental researchers and water experts that more than 60 per cent of Ghana’s water bodies had been polluted by illegal mining activities.
According to him, the situation posed serious environmental, health and livelihood risks, particularly to farmers and fishermen whose livelihoods depended on clean and sustainable water resources.
He said the tributaries feeding the Volta Lake were particularly important to the region’s agricultural and fishing communities and warned that pollution upstream could eventually affect the Lake and the livelihoods dependent on it.
“The same waters our own fishermen depend on to feed their families are under threat,” he said, stressing that the issue should therefore not be treated as an abstract national statistic.
Mr Woanyah said farmers in communities whose streams and rivers eventually fed into the Volta Lake depended on those water sources for crop production, while fishermen along the Lake depended on its waters for their livelihoods.
He urged the government to take urgent steps to prevent illegal mining activities from spreading into the tributaries and water bodies that sustained communities in the Volta Region.
Mr Woanyah also linked the galamsey crisis to concerns over the country’s gold trade, questioning what he described as the loss of about $1.7 billion in gold-related transactions.
He said the NPP supported the Minority’s call for a full parliamentary investigation into the reported financial loss and demanded that all relevant documents and records be made available for scrutiny.
“When we ask GoldBod and this government to explain how $1.7 billion vanished while illegal mining exploded on their watch, we are not asking an academic question from a podium,” he said.
He said the demand for accountability was also on behalf of farmers, fishermen and other communities whose livelihoods depended on the protection of the country’s natural resources.
Mr Woanyah maintained that the fight against illegal mining required urgent and sustained action to protect lives, restore polluted water bodies, and safeguard the livelihoods of communities.
He called on the government to strengthen enforcement and ensure that persons responsible for environmental destruction were held accountable.
He said the NPP in the Volta Region would continue to raise concerns over the protection of the region’s water resources, stressing that the cost of inaction could become even more devastating if urgent measures were not taken.
GNA
Edited By: Maxwell Awumah/Kenneth Odeng Adade
Sept 01, 2026