The MP for Asunafo South who is also the Minority Ranking Member on Parliament’s Committee on Food and Agriculture, Eric Opoku, has warned the Akufo-Addo government to clamp down on illegal mining popularly known as galamsey to save cocoa plantations in the country.
He said activities of illegal mining in the cocoa growing regions such as Western, Eastern and Ashanti Regions are depleting cocoa plantations.
For instance, he said galamsey activities have not only heavily polluted rivers in the Eastern Region but claimed about 81% of cocoa farms.
Opoku, a former Ashanti Regional Minister, who was speaking to Oheneba Boamah Bennie on the Gumbe Show on TV XYZ bemoaned the faster rate in which cocoa farms were being lost to indiscriminate illegal mining in the Ashanti and Western Regions.
“Illegal mining is ripping Ghana off its position as the number one Cocoa producing country,” he said while pointing to the government’s failure to clamp on the canker.
“In the Eastern Region where our President, Nana Akufo-Addo hails from has become a hub of galamsey. About 81%of cocoa plantations have been destroyed by illegal miners,” he narrated.
As a rural MP, he said the government ought to protect the cocoa industry since it is one of the key sectors that earn Ghana a lot of foreign exchange.
The former Brong Ahafo Regional Minister said his research has shown that farmers are being pushed into poverty due to the dwindling cocoa production in the country coupled with the rising cost of fertilizers.
Apart from blaming the Akufo-Addo government for failing to fight galamsey, the MP further narrated that the country was sinking under the current Government due to corruption and mismanagement.
He also pointed to the Bank of Ghana losses of over 60 billion cedis as a great crime being witnessed under the government, saying the generation yet unborn will pay for Akufo-Addo’s sins.
Source: Ghana Web
