Galamsey impact: Jobs or curse?
Story: Joyce Kpeglo
The women gather by the clean and beautiful stream, getting water into their pans as they chat and giggle and gossip about anything and everything.
The children at the far end of the bank, swimming and playing in the water, sending out screams of joy, which the green lustrous forests scream back in a form of a whoosh of refreshing breeze and singing birds.
The men ride on boats on the river, to get their best catch.
The women and children go to their simple but comfortable homes where they sit and bond with their fathers, husbands and brothers who also returned from a tiring but fruitful harvest at their farms or a satisfactory catch on the river.
Paradise of gold
This was indeed a paradise, a paradise some called the Ashanti empire, or the old Ghana Empire. A paradise abundant with resources, healthy and happy people.
This paradise had the most attractive shiny treasure, gold.
The coast, was the ‘street of gold’ part of this heaven. When this part was discovered, it was named the Gold Coast. Little did the people of this homeland know that the new commercial relevance given to this gold by the “discoverers’, was the beginning of the destruction of their lovely and blissful home.
The paradise went through a tremendous change as it had new rulers, new systems and new ideas, all very alien to those who lived in it. However, adaptation to this new change was necessary.
The peaceful, fruitful world they knew became a land where only the fittest survived. The fittest were those who had the power and those with money and great wealth, had highest power.
Gold, the most attractive treasure of the former paradise, became the highest commercial comparison to getting money and having the power and ability to live a comfortable life.
In comes Ghana
After many decades of the alien systems coming into place, the former paradise got a new name, Ghana. Independent, free state, were other words used to describe it.
The new name didn’t change much. The greed to hoard the highest power still persists. It was not only the people who lived in it that had this greed and sense of survival, the new alien ‘discoverers’ had it too, even more than the indigenous people.
They took control of the lustrous green forests and made them as bare as the sole of feet.
They sacked away the birds and other sentient inhabitants of the forests and killed the streams and rivers with poisonous chemicals (mercury) and machinery.
All these were not deemed as a big issue, because then it was just about two communities giving complaints and just about five machines and foreign companies doing the evil.
Galamsey
As time went on, the former paradise did not just stop being a paradise, it started looking almost as yellow as gold with the emergence of a new activity used in gathering and selling the highest treasure called “Galamsey”.
Funny enough, just like how the indigenous people mistook the alien ruler name Sir Garnet Wolseley for ‘Sagranti’, they mistook ‘Gathering them and selling’’ for galamsey.
Ghana the free state, acknowledged this time this was a big issue and therefore deemed it as illegal, thus against the law.
But it was too late, the greed of those in power, the foreigners and the sense of survival of the average citizen who was finding means to survive amidst no alternatives had taken over.
Till this very moment, trees are being cut down, big and deep holes created are claiming lives of people, rivers are getting too toxic to drink, and farm lands have become too barren to farm on and lives of people who are against all these are under threat.
The wails of people are falling on deaf ears, their cries about their exposure to health challenges such as cancer, respiratory diseases, malaria from stagnant waters in holes created, and other problems like starvation, loss of lives and livelihood, among others are being covered up by blame games and meagre money incentives. Their wounds and suffering are being mixed with the salty lies and promises of power and money drunk rulers.
The unfortunate people who engage in this illegal mining activities by digging pits and sluices, searching and washing minerals with their bare hands and inadequate tolls and machines are called galamsayers. The French give them a much fancier name; orpailleurs.
The ones who have lost their way, or have no other way to take even tend to receive very little after weeks and month of engaging in a dangerous activity that could cost their lives. Some have indeed met their end, engaging in such activities. On November 13,2009, a collapse occurred in an illegal, privately owned, in Dompoase, in the Ashanti region of Ghana. At least 18 workers were killed, including 13 women who served as porters for the miners.
It is not their fault; this is what they have been influenced to believe is their only chance of survival.
It is not their fault; they have to live up to the social expectation to be successful as quickly as possible. They want praise and acceptance given to those with money.
It is not their fault, the state that is to ensure they enjoy their economic freedom without much hassle has abandoned them, they have failed to provide community centered alternative jobs.
‘Only job available, we can’t stop it’
Recently, Chief of Akyem Wenchi and Oseawuohene in the Eastern Region, Daasebre Dr Asumadu Appiah, stated that the youth in Wenchi and its surrounding areas are unlikely to cease engaging in “galamsey,” despite efforts to curb the activity.
He stated that ‘Galamsey is the only job available in our community. We cannot stop it if you ask us to. What we need are good policies and guidelines to conduct mining responsibly’ We’ve heard of community mining schemes, and I’ve already submitted an application to the district to participate in it.
There are few angels trying their genuine best to save the once beautiful and abundant land of Ghana from deteriorating any further. Among these are the journalists of the media, certain chiefs, organizations concerned about the environment and some health officials.
H.R.H Otumfuo Osei Tutu II has spoken about the need to stop illegal mining. Multimedia’s Erastus Donkor, was awarded Journalist of the year at the GJA awards 2024 for his extensive work on exposing the ills of galamsey.
Media General’s Johnny on Johnny bite show on TV3 featured episodes where he showed the fields and communities destroyed by galamsey and crtiqued the negligence of government in curbing the canker.
Investigative journalist Anas also exposed officials owning illegal mining sites, interviewing farmers who have lost their cocoa farmlands to the activity,
These and other initiatives such as giving health advice to people around such areas has has shed significant light on the issue and pressured government to take some actions in solving the issue. However, the canker still keeps eating into the agricultural and economic fibers of Ghana.
Mahatma Ghandi remarks, Nature has given us enough to satisfy every man’s need not every man’s greed.
It is possible that nature got angry with the people who caused her harm. Nature doesn’t rain on time as she used to, during the dry season, the intense scorch of the sun clearly shows that these galamsey activities are one that needs to be put to a stop for the survival of Ghana
Some speak of the need to appease nature and our creator to solve the canker, some believe ridding the nation of all aliens is the way to go, some pray those in political power burn in hell for their sins, others have hope that the problem would be gone as sudden as it came.
This story ends with how the future of the Ghana is most probably going to look like;
The people would continue to weep,
The land would be bare enough to sweep
The foreigners would continue to steal,
The wounds and suffering would not heal,
More would desire to be ‘galamseyers’
In hopes to be their own or family’s financial saviours
Like some form of contagious disease,
The search to gather and sell gold would not cease
Unless jobs are given to replace galamsey incentives.
Unless integrity and patriotism overrides greed.
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