The Greater Accra Regional SRC General Secretary, Gloria Jean Coleman, says the fight against galamsey would have been won if the government had been consistent with its efforts.
According to her, the inconsistency of government in the galamsey fight has affected young children of school going age, forcing them to drop out of school in the pursuit of wealth.
“On a Likert scale of 1-10, I will rate the government’s fight against galamsey at a low 2 points. Young children in these galamsey communities have seen their older brothers make loads of money from galamsey and would rather drop out of school to follow the same path,” she told Sefah-Danquah on the maiden edition of e.tv Ghana’s Campus Dialogue, themed; ‘Ghana’s Fight Against Illegal Small Scale Mining’.
Focused on the education of these young ones, Gloria believes with the consistency of government in the fight against galamsey, then the anticipated victory will be achieved, putting these young children back in school.
Ghana’s mining industry has been benefiting from child labour in unlicensed mines, Human Rights Watch said, after conducting field observations in the Western, Central and Ashanti Regions.
It is estimated that thousands of children, mostly between the ages of 15 and 17, have been working in perilous conditions pulling ore out of shafts and processing it with toxic mercury violating Ghanaian and international law, it was stated in the 82-page report.
With the lack of “due diligence” and many foreign companies buying gold from the country, which is one of the world’s top gold producers, child rights and labour stand poorly regulated.
Ghana’s Children’s Act prohibits mining work for anyone under the age of 18.
However, lax enforcement of the law and a lack of systematic inspections have led to continued child labour within the mining industry.
By; Joel Sanco