A member of the communications team of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) Ellen Ama Daaku has welcomed a call by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to Ghanaians to depoliticize the fight against illegal small scale mining (Galamsey).
However, she said, since there is an opposition party that is ready to take political capital out of the fight against the menace, the NPP will also do politics with it but in a cautious way.
President Akufo-Addo held a meeting with the National House of Chiefs in Kumasi on Wednesday October 5 in the issue of galamsey.
During the meeting, Mr Akufo-Addo said among other things, that there there was the need to decouple politics from the fight against illicit mining activities.
He said “It is obvious that, if we are to win the fight, you and l have to take the lead to collaborate closely to do so. That is why I am here today. After our meeting, I will also be meeting with the other half of the local government [institutions]-the Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Chief Executives in the ninety metropolitan, municipal, and district areas across the country, where mining activities take place, to seek their active collaboration.
“There are many requests I intend to make of you in the close-door session of our meeting, but one of the most significant, which I have to state now, is to seek your assistance to take partisan political interests out of the fight against galamsey.”
“It can only succeed if it is a truly national battle, which no one seeks to exploit for political gain, as we saw in the last election.”
Speaking on this on the New Day show with Berla Mundi on TV3 Thursday October 6, Madam Daaku who expressed optimism that the meeting will yield positive results said “Another statement that [President Akufo-Addo] made which in a way I agree with him and in a way I don’t with him is the fact that we shouldn’t politicize this.
“I agree with him because at the stage we are getting to we need to get the problem solved, as for the politics we can always do it. So in that score I agree with him. But in a way, I do not also agree with him because we have an opposition that forgets that they are also liable, that forgets that they also part of the process and we are all Ghanaians and we need to get this solved and the politics will also come in.
“So for me, as much as Mr President is saying we shouldn’t bring politics, Mr President, as for this one, the politics, we will do it but we will do it with caution.”
Source: 3news.com|Ghana