I Don’t Support Galamsey – NDC Chairman

The Upper Denkyira East Constituency Chairman of the NDC, John Swanzy Arhin, has described recent publications suggesting his support for illegal and irresponsible mining, popularly called galamsey, as untrue.

He blamed the faceless people behind such ‘blackmail’ to desist from drawing him into unnecessary controversies.

Mr. John Swanzy Arhin disclosed this in an interview with the media in Cape Coast of the Central Region.

He expressed his full support for the government’s fight against galamsey, accusing the operators of polluting water bodies in the area, a situation that threatens human, animal, and plant lives.

According to Arhin, since the National Democratic Congress assumed the executive power, he, Municipal Assembly officials, and some traditional rulers have been sensitizing the people against such nefarious deeds.

Mr. Swanzy Arhin, however, raised concerns about growing criminal activities in the area, where miners lose their money, gold, and other belongings to thieves disguised as National Security.

This ‘unlawful’ incident, he suggested, could potentially dent the government’s image, resulting in the loss of public support for the NDC.

Recently, John said he heard about the presence of the alleged military men at Dunkwa-on-Offin when he was at Bogoso, and he notified his subordinate, Sidi Mohammed, to go and find out if the men were military officers.

This move to verify if the uniformed men were real military personnel, according to Mr. John Swanzy Arhin, did not please the military officers, who pounced on Sidi Mohammed and beat him mercilessly.

Mr. John Swanzy Arhin said that soldiers vented their spleen on him when he tried to intervene by asking them to stop beating Sidi and take him to the Dunkwa-on-Offin police station to address the matter.

He added that it took the timely intervention of his schoolmate, Erastus Asare Donkor, an Accra-based Joy FM reporter who was with the military, to spare Sidi Mohammed from the brutality.

Mr. John Swanzy Arhin disclosed that the men in uniform abandoned the 37-year-old Sidi Mohammed under a bridge located between the Central and the Ashanti regions.

He noted that, much as he supports the military intervention in combatting galamsey activities, he would appreciate it if the ‘anti-illegal mining’ operation could proceed without indiscriminately harassing innocent citizens. He said that, but for his timely intervention, Sidi’s friends could have attacked the military personnel.

Judging by what transpired in the Upper Denkyira East Constituency last weekend, Mr. Swanzy Arhin pleaded with the Ministry of Interior to help reduce the escalating brutalities of the military officers against the citizenry. He cited an instance at Obuasi where seven illegal miners were killed, while several lives were lost when a misunderstanding arose between 60 illegal miners and the military in the third week of January this year as an issue that negatively affects peace and justice in the country.

Mr. John Swanzy Arhin said the attack on Sidi Mohammed, whose only crime was to determine if the uniformed men were truly state security officials, was an injustice, urging the government to bring the perpetrators to book.

Mr. John Swanzy Arhin appealed to the media to double-check their news reports to avoid publishing untruths about people, referring to an earlier publication that alleged that he and Sidi came under military brutality for attempting to obstruct the government’s fight against illegal mining.