Dr Kenneth Ashigbey, the Convener of the Media Coalition Against Galamsey, has said the civil society organisations have been waiting for President John Dramani Mahama’s invitation to dialogue on galamsey.
He revealed that the CSOs are prepared to demand clarity from President John Mahama on what constitutes success in the galamsey fight.
Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express on Wednesday, Dr Kenneth Ashigbey stated, “We have been waiting for this invitation, because the coalition had written to His Excellency, the President, and he had directed that we meet with the Minister for Lands in the first instance, and he was going to meet us. And we know that the minister had reported back to him, so we were expecting that.”
He added, “The only surprise we got was the fact that over 50 or so people have been invited, you know, and so it was going to really be a very large gathering. And so again, the agenda is not being, and the format of the meeting has not been clearly spelt out.”
“We will take advantage of every opportunity that is given to us to resolve this. But even we are not going into this meeting to go and articulate the problems. We know very clearly what the problems are, and we know His Excellency knows what the problems are.”
“Like we said in our last press release that we gave, we are going to go into this meeting asking His Excellency, the President, what his definition of success is, what he would classify as having successfully executed this particular thing”.
Dr Kenneth Ashigbey also noted that the fight against galamsey cannot be abandoned.
He pointed out, “If you see the reports you’re churning out, and you see some of the reports that the EPA has done with some partners, it is telling us that it’s not only the turbidity that is exceeded 98,000 NTU.
But also the fact that what we all feared is what is happening, that we have been ingesting a lot of these pollutants.”
Dr Ashigbey added, “We cannot, you know, give up. We need to fight this. People who are dying, people who are being poisoned, people who are being killed. And so the best we can do is to clutch at any straw that we have to be able to go up”.
“Unfortunately, the environmental criminals involved in this would want us to give up. But the bad news for them is that we are not going to give up, and we are going to continue fighting till we can clean our water bodies.”
Meanwhile, President John Dramani Mahama has invited Civil Society Organisations to a high-level engagement on illegal mining.
The meeting is scheduled for Friday, 3rd October, 2025, at 12:00 noon at Jubilee House.
The dialogue is expected to bring together government officials and civil society leaders to find a lasting solution to the menace of illegal mining.
In a letter issued by Dr Callistus Mahama, Secretary to the President, it indicates the dialogue will serve as a platform for frank and constructive discussions on illegal mining.
The letter stated, “This engagement aims to provide a platform for frank and constructive dialogue between the Government and civil society on the menace of illegal mining, with a view to harnessing collective expertise, perspectives, and solutions to address this national challenge”.
President Mahama’s invitation comes at a time when his government have been receiving backlash over their failure to properly deal with illegal mining.
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