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0 NewsGhana, Latest Updates and Breaking News of Ghana, News Ghana, https://www.newsghana.com.gh/four-die-at-government-reclamation-site-in-amansie/Four illegal miners died on Wednesday afternoon after a pit collapsed at a former galamsey site in Skuumu near Gyaman-Nkwanta in the Amansie Central District of the Ashanti Region, with the deaths occurring at a location the government had already handed over to a private company for environmental reclamation.
The incident happened around 4:00pm, plunging the community into grief. According to information gathered, the abandoned and depleted site had been transferred to Logist Group Company Limited for reclamation works after authorities declared it exhausted. Despite that designation, the victims allegedly entered the site without authorisation to engage in further illegal mining when the pit gave way and buried them underground.
The leader of the group has been identified as Solomon Amadevor. The three others who died alongside him have not been officially named as investigations continue.
Security personnel including the Ghana Police Service were deployed to the scene immediately after news of the collapse spread, and rescue efforts began without delay. An excavator was brought in on Wednesday evening to dig through the collapsed earth, and the bodies of all four victims were retrieved from the site the same night.
The circumstances of the deaths add a troubling new dimension to Ghana’s persistent illegal mining crisis. Sites designated for reclamation are intended to close off exhausted and dangerous pits from further human activity and restore degraded land. The fact that miners entered and died at a handover site raises questions about the adequacy of site security during and after the transfer of custody from government institutions to private rehabilitation companies.
Residents described the incident as heartbreaking and called for stronger enforcement around both active and decommissioned mining sites.
NewsGhana, Latest Updates and Breaking News of Ghana, News Ghana, https://www.newsghana.com.gh/four-die-at-government-reclamation-site-in-amansie/
