(Bloomberg) -- Hundreds of Ghanaians have called on their government to clamp down on illegal mining in Africa’s top gold producer in a second day of protests.
Placard-wielding demonstrators had called on Thursday for the release of fellow protesters who were arrested in an earlier march. On Friday, their demands focused on the need to crack down on illegal mining that’s blamed for polluting rivers and soils in the West African nation. A last day of protests is planned Saturday.
“This is not a crisis but a fight for our nation’s soul,” Brownson Adatsi, the lead convener for the Free The Citizens Movement, said, reading out a petition in the capital, Accra. “Our children’s future is at stake, and we cannot, and will not stand by while our nation is ravaged by greed and negligence.”
Gold is a mainstay of the Ghanaian economy, accounting for nearly half of exports in 2023, according to central bank data. Large-scale miners such as Newmont Corp. and Gold Fields Ltd. have to adhere to strict environmental rules, but a thriving artisanal and small-scale mining industry is less regulated. Within the small-mining space, authorities concede that a large number of mines operate illegally, which means there’s no oversight over their activities.
Known as ‘galamsey’, a colloquialism originating from the phrase “gather them and sell,” illegal mining has been spreading with impunity, according to activists.
Unions are also putting pressure on the government to act, with just two months left before Dec. 7 presidential elections.
The incumbent, Nana Akufo-Addo, met with the country’s biggest labor union, Trades Union Congress, Thursday, the presidency said in a statement. The closed-door meeting came after the union announced it would be embarking on an indefinite strike from Oct. 10 to demand a ban on all forms of small-scale gold mining. A spokesman for the union couldn’t immediately be reached for comment about the outcome of that meeting Friday.
Artisanal and small-scale mining sector, officially accounts for about a third of Ghana’s gold production, but not all of it is illegal.
For many, ‘artisanal and small-scale’ still conjures images of people eking out a living using rudimentary tools, like chisels to break ore or pans to scoop up gold-bearing sediments. But there’s been an increased use of large excavation machinery and dredging equipment. Some of these machines are used near rivers and forests - and even inside them - and there’s no effort made to rehabilitate mining sites after excavation when operations are illegal. That’s left soils and rivers polluted, causing disease and water shortages.
“There’s no small-scale mining anymore,” one of the placards read.
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