During his Nationwide Tour, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), promised to elevate small-scale miners to millionaire status if he becomes president.
Speaking to a gathering of small-scale miners in the Western Region, the vice president detailed his plans to overhaul the mining sector for the benefit of local miners.
He underscored the importance of implementing community mining schemes in disused shafts and exploring new mining areas as strategies to generate employment opportunities and foster wealth creation among citizens.
“We will talk to the big mining companies; abandoned shafts, we will open them as community mining schemes for our people, and the new places that we will discover, we will open them. We will create jobs for our people, we will make you millionaires and we will make you rich, that is what we are going to do,” he declared.
Despite Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia’s pledge, some small-scale miners remain skeptical.
Michael Kojo Peprah, President of the Small-Scale Miners Association, dismissed Bawumia’s promise as mere political rhetoric.
He highlighted the challenges endured by small-scale miners during the current administration, such as a one-year ban on their sector and the contentious Operation Vanguard.
“I think he is just trying to lie to us. We became very poor when his government came into power. That was when they placed a one-year ban on our sector.
We were in this country when the government started burning excavators when they brought about this operation Vanguard.
“He was the vice president. Joe Osei Owusu told us in this country to shoot to kill small-scale miners. He never did or said anything to console us. We were here when excavators flew from Ghana into our neighbouring countries, he never said anything.
“So if you have about eight months to redeem whatever your government has done and you’ve not been able to do it, and you come back to tell us that you want to make us millionaires, then we take what he said as a joke.”