{"id":97026,"date":"2025-10-04T17:38:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T17:38:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=97026"},"modified":"2025-10-04T17:38:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T17:38:17","slug":"we-are-doing-more-to-mobilise-gold-than-to-stop-illegal-mining-kofi-bentil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=97026","title":{"rendered":"We are doing more to mobilise gold than to stop illegal mining \u2013 Kofi Bentil"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>2 Minute, 42 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>
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Senior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has criticised the government\u2019s approach to tackling illegal mining, commonly known as galamsey, saying that despite years of dialogue, the situation has only worsened.<\/p>\n

Speaking on JoyNews\u2019 Newsfile<\/em> <\/strong>programme on Saturday, October 4, Mr. Bentil said Ghana has witnessed \u201ca lot of activities and talk but no real progress\u201d in addressing the menace.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe have talked and talked. I have said all kinds of things, some taken, some not taken. Activity is not the same as progress. We are seeing a lot of activities, a lot of stimulations, a lot of talk, but no progress,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He lamented that while the government had succeeded in creating structures like the Goldboard, passing laws, and setting up institutions to buy and trade gold, it had failed to stop illegal mining.<\/p>\n

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\u201cDespite all the mountain of talks, when this government came in, nothing or not much has been done in terms of stopping galamsey. But we have been able to establish Goldbod, pass the law, pass the L.I., set up the institutions, go onto the ground, start buying gold\u2014and we have mobilised millions of dollars\u2019 worth of gold, sold it, and done all kinds of things all within this space. But we have not been able to stop galamsey,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

According to Mr. Bentil, the country\u2019s focus has shifted from ending the destruction of water bodies and farmlands to harnessing gold from illegal sources to stabilise the economy.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe have managed to set up systems to harness galamsey gold, convert it into dollars, and stabilise the economy\u2014but we have not been able to stop galamsey. There is a lot of talk, no action, and the action is rather in harnessing galamsey gold to establish this economy or make it better,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He added that while some might see this as beneficial, it reflects misplaced priorities and a lack of sincerity in dealing with the problem.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI have come to the conclusion that we will not win the galamsey fight. There is no sincerity in doing that. All of us are going to pay a very heavy price for some people\u2019s private profit. It is not you and I who have to stop galamsey\u2014it is the President, his cabinet, his ministers, and the people we have given authority to go and solve it. To me, they don\u2019t have any interest in solving it because they think not solving it has better benefit for them politically,\u201d he argued.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mr. Bentil urged the public to focus on tangible results rather than political statements.<\/p>\n

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\u201cDon\u2019t watch the talk, watch the action. All the things I saw and heard yesterday were what I expected to hear, and I have been hearing them for over ten years. As we speak, there is more galamsey now than we had yesterday. New equipment has come into this country and found itself on galamsey sites,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He further noted that while Ghana continues to profit from the sale of gold mined illegally, the core issue of stopping galamsey remains unaddressed.<\/p>\n

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\u201cLet\u2019s be honest with ourselves. We are doing more to mobilise the gold than to stop the mining,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

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\"WeSenior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has criticised the government\u2019s approach to tackling illegal mining, commonly known as galamsey, saying that despite years of dialogue, the situation has only worsened.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2160,800,3866,1883,117,10,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gold","category-illegal-mining","category-kofi-bentil","category-national","category-news","category-politics","category-popular"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=97026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97026\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=97026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=97026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=97026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}