Fighting galamsey: Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission calls for true leadership

The Head and Missionary-in-charge of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission, Ghana, Alhajj Maulvi Noor Mohammed Bin Salih, has called on political leaders to stop deceiving Ghanaians and demonstrate the true leadership needed to tackle the devastating impact of illegal mining.

He said given the alarming rate at which galamsey was polluting water bodies and destroying farmlands with harmful chemicals, politicians must put the larger interest of the people ahead of their parochial interest.

“Politics is supposed to be human-focused but unfortunately, some of our greedy politicians are the ones behind galamsey that is destroying our water bodies.

“They are the very ones who are financing this utter destruction to the country and our people, but they care little whatever the negative outcomes are,” he said.

Lip service

Addressing the 29th annual Greater Accra Region conference of the Ahmadiyya Muslim in Accra last Sunday, Alhajj Bin Salih said “We only get lip services in the form of promises to do something about galamsey, but we turn round to find the opposite that it is those lip services that we are deceived with and the very lip services that encourage galamsey.

The congregation

“They are the very ones that encourage all the negative activities that we can think of in this country, which does not augur well for the welfare of the Ghanaian, and it is time for the Ghanaian to tell them in the face that enough is enough.

“It is for this reason that I stand here to add my voice to those patriotic Ghanaians who are calling for a state of emergency in this country since an orderly democratic system is not able to solve our problems.

“We need the state of emergency to be able to go back to the drawing board and see to it that we save our water bodies and see to it that we Ghanaians live dignified life and see to it that our children are not born with deformities and our parents and relatives in the villages do not necessarily die because of pollution and the toxic materials that we bring to bear on their life,” he said.

Stop amassing wealth

The Head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission said Ghana was small in size but well-endowed to the extent that almost every natural resource could be found in the country.

But, unfortunately, with all that God-given wealth, the people had “brought ourselves to a stage where we are recognised as one of the poorest countries in the world”.

He attributed the situation to the fact that Ghanaians had placed all the country’s natural resources and other wealth in the hands of political leaders to hold them in trust for them.

He, however, said instead of holding the resources in trust for the people, most political leaders were greedily amassing wealth and were living above the larger population of Ghana.

“Instead of using the wealth to take care of the Ghanaian, what we find is that corruption is the order of the day, and corruption only aids a few among us to amass wealth to the detriment of the larger community.

“It is now time for such politicians to know that they have no right to behave that way, and that we are sounding a warning that enough is enough, and they must stop,” he said.