Akufo-Addo lacked commitment to fight galamsey – Kpebu

Private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu has accused President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of lacking the commitment to fight illegal small-scale mining practices (Galamsey).

He says although the president announced that he was putting his presidency on the line to fight galamsey, the pronouncement was mere rhetoric.

“The President didn’t walk his talk,” Kpebu said on the Key Points on TV3 on Saturday, June 15.

“He is the Commander In Chief and so if the operation galam-stop made up of the Police and Military failed then he has failed,” he added.

He stressed, “President Akufo-Addo didn’t have the commitment to fight galamsey.”

For his part, Lawmaker for Asante Akim North Kwame Andy Appiah-Kubi said the Galamsey fight will be successful if the entire community is involved in the fight.

He says he has been successful in stopping the illicit mining practices in his constituency because of the involvement of the whole community in the fight.

“This is a fight for the whole community, you need to mobilise the whole community,” he said on the same show.

“Galamsey will not happen in my constituency,” he stressed.

The discussion on the Key Points centered on the comments made by the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) Parliamentary Candidate for the constituency, Ernest Frimpong regarding galamsey.

Mr Frimpong was seen and heard in a video that has gone viral on social media telling illegal miners to attack any military or security officer who attempts stopping them from engaging in ‘galamsey.’

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He urged them to initiate reprisal attacks on the military, promising them that himself, the MCE and the Western Regional Minister, Kwabena Okyere Darko Mensah, who was present at the meeting, will always protect them.

The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) subsequently issued a statement urging members of the public to desist from attacking soldiers as that would amount to a grave offence.

He was arrested and subsequently granted bail.