Blaming unemployment for illegal mining wrong – Rev. Frimpong-Manso

The President of the Ghana Pentecostal and Charismatic Council, Rev. Prof. Paul Frimpong-Manso, has said the argument that people are actively engaged in illegal mining due to a lack of jobs should not be encouraged.

According to the council, the lack of jobs should not be the reason for perpetuating illegality and causing environmental degradation.

In an interview with Citi News, Rev. Frimpong Manso said “what you are saying [with this argument] is that the end justifies the means, and if we do this, somebody will go and sell drugs because there are no jobs.”

“When we bring these kinds of things into our national discourse, then we are not aiming for development and progress,” he added.

The government has in the past few years launched and implemented strategies to help deal with the illegal mining problem and its effects on the environment.

But illegal mining has remained on the ascendancy as river bodies, forest reserves and farmlands have all been destroyed.

Rev. Frimpong-Manso also lamented the failure of institutions to strictly enforce mining laws.

“The institutions are not working,” he complained.

Rev. Frimpong-Manso thus said a ban on all mining needed to be put in place “until processes and procedures have been put in place.”

 

 

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