Since they are mostly potential warlords-in-the-making, the time has come for officialdom to clip their wings – by withdrawing all the small-scale mining licences and permits issued to individuals and business entities who use excavators and bulldozers to mine gold in Ghana.
We are definitely looking at a situation in which issued small-scale gold mining permits are being used to give legal cover to gold mining that is not small-scale in scope.
The authorities must act now before it is too late to do so – and we all end up as the victims of ‘small-scale’ gold miners: living blighted lives in a desolate land, lumbered with poisoned soils, and contending with streams and rivers polluted by cyanide and mercury. A word to the wise…
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