Govt to establish situational room to monitor illegal mining

The government will establish a situational room to monitor and coordinate the activities of illegal miners remotely across the country.

By this, the activities of miners and mining equipment will be monitored and transmitted digitally to the office of the Minerals Commission.

The Deputy Minister for Lands and Natural Resources responsible for Mining, George Mireku Duker, who disclosed this at an engagement with Chiefs and Local Government Authorities in the Ashanti region said, the government was committed to sanitizing the small-scale mining industry to sustainably contribute to the socio-economic development of the nation.

The Minister said the commitment was to protect and safeguard the nation's abundant resources for future generations.

He stated that the situational room would be an addition to the deployment of river guards to permanently patrol river bodies and the establishment of Community Mining Schemes to encourage sustainable mining.

Mr Mireku Duker asserted that everyone involved in the fight against illegal mining should be motivated to actively participate to ensure that future generations have access to clean water.

“We must all come together and declare that never again are we going to allow people to mine in our river bodies. The good steps we are taking have caught the attention of other countries like Sudan, South Africa and Zambia, which have all been here to study our small-scale mining regime,” he disclosed.

“What is left for us is to protect our water bodies. We know it’s not an event and we may not be able to completely abolish illegal mining but we can reduce it to the barest minimum. It won’t be an easy battle but we can win. The government is doing its part; we must also do ours,” he added.

On his part, the Ashanti Regional Minister, Mr Simon Osei Mensah, urged residents in the region to report illegal mining activities in their localities.