As the December 7 2024 elections draw close, the flagbearer of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Alhaji Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has taken his regional tour to the western region where he has promised the Chiefs and people that, should he win the upcoming elections, he will amend the Minerals Act.
According to Dr. Bawumia, the proposed amendment is intended to incorporate the Chiefs, who are the custodians of the land, into the mineral licensing process, to ensure their absolute involvement in discussion process before any miner can obtain a license to operate in a given area.
The Vice President made this pledge when he was interaction with the Chiefs at the Western regional house of chiefs on Thursday, May 2, 2024.
Dr. Bawumia opined that the various issues being faced by the small scale mining sector is attributed to the lack of opportunities to involve chiefs and other traditional authorities when miners are being issued mining licenses.
He proposed an amendment of the Minerals Act to include Chiefs in his mining industry formalization programme if elected as President during the December 7 general elections.
He stated, “we want to formalise small-scale mining, but we cannot be successful without the participation of Chiefs. The chiefs have to be part of the licensing of miners in their locality. They have to be part of the whole process. And so, we have to make the necessary amendments to the Mining Act to do all of this. Decentralise the Mineral Commission to be in the various districts, decentralise the Environmental Protection Agency.”
The Vice President, as part of his visit to the region, is expected to meet up with market women and business owners to have series of interactions with them to enable him have first hand information of their needs and how to factor their needs in his policy development.
Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia started off his regional Tour in the Eastern region where he met religious leaders and some market women and taxi drivers, after which he came to the Greater Accra region, specifically, Dome Market to interact with traders and some officials of the party in the Dome-Kwabenya constituency.
