After an expose by The Fourth Estate on mining in forest reserves, the Minerals Commission has deleted some key information about some mining companies from their website.
This reaction which many deem as a cover up, comes after The Fourth Estate released an expose about some bigwigs belonging to the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and government appointees being granted concessions to mine in the country’s protected forests.
The information which has been wiped from the mineral commission’s website has to do with ‘contact persons’ of mining companies and the political associations of persons applying for mining leases.
The Chief Executive of the Minerals Commission, Martin Ayisi, during an interview The Fourth Estate described contact persons whose information have been deleted from the website as consultants, who apply for these licenses on behalf of mining companies. This means these so called consultants serve as liaisons between the minerals commission and the companies interested in mining leases.
In a recent exposé by the The Fourth Estate, it was revealed that the NPP’s Parliamentary Candidate for Juaben, Francis Owusu-Akyaw, serves as the contact person for at least 15 mining companies, helping them obtain mining licenses to operate in protected forests across various regions in Ghana.
With this revelation The Fourth Estate contacted the head of the minerals commission on the essence of researching into individuals applying for mining leases, to ascertain their political affiliations where he said, “Sometimes it informs the kind of decision you should make.”
Following the deletion of these key pieces of information from their website, the head of the Commission has failed to did not respond to The Fourth Estate’s enquiries.
