The Chief Executive Officer of Okobeng Mining Company, Nana Okobeng Amponsah, has debunked media reports that he has fired gunshots at two key small-scale miners at an illegal gold site at Gwira-Ampasie in the Evalue-Ajomoro-Gwira Municipality of the Western Region.
He has however admitted that he fired warning shots when he, together with Nana Adu, visited the site of the miners at Gwira-Ampasie as the illegal miners pelted stones at them in their efforts to prevent them from entering their illegal mining site which has been polluting River Akonbra and other water bodies.
To set the record straight, the seasoned miner stated that he has legally secured a 31.5 kilometers square gold mining concession at Dominase in the Evalue-Ajomoro-Gwira Municipality of the Western Region but the recent allegations levelled against him that he fired gunshots to kill these two miners were completely untrue and unfounded.
He explained that the case is currently in court in Half Assini.
He said the two miners who have accused him have since not shown up in the court for four consecutive sittings but rather choose to make noise in the media.
He said their paymasters have used media practitioners and houses to publish a series of bad stories to tarnish his hard-won reputation with the aim of scoring political points.
Nana Okobeng Amponsah told journalists that the so-called story of him shooting to kill was cooked by the two miners with the advice from their paymasters to soil his personal reputation.
He noted that he has become a prime target of attack by thousands of illegal small-scale miners who are indiscriminately mining gold resources from the communities such as Bamiankor, Ayinase, Gwira-Ampasie, Akango, Dualle, and Akosono in the Evalue-Ajomoro-Gwira Municipality.
“Since l secured my concession and got the necessary legal licenses and permits from the state mining regulatory institutions including Mineral Commission and Environmental Protection Agency, l am using the legal means to protect my gold mining concession from being invaded by the illegal small-scale miners. When l noticed that anyone invaded my concession, l reported that person to the police to be arrested and processed before the law court. And that a lot of people who are illegal small-scale miners in these communities hated me,” the seasoned legal miner explained.
According to Nana Okobeng Amponsah, his recent woes were orchestrated by a leading member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) who doubles as the Member of Parliament (MP) in the Western Region (name withheld) who are in the league with the senior police officer in Takoradi to influence the two small scale miners to accuse him of shooting to kill them in galamsey site.
Nana Okobeng Amponsah pointed out that there is clear evidence from the record in the hospital being attended by the two small-scale miners that there are no gun bullets in their wounds.
“To push their devil agenda further, such a faceless MP and a senior police officer at Takoradi have taken the two miners to the Sekondi District Police Command to secretly secure the police hospital forms for the two to be taken to the hospital to claim that they had sustained the gunfire wounds while there is clear evidence that the two were hurt by bamboo stick when they were working at the illegal small scale mining site at Gwira-Ampasie.
He stated that when the two sent the police forms to the hospital he has been informed that the consulted medical doctor told them that they should re-send the police hospital forms to their area of jurisdiction for the doctor there to sign the forms for them.
“However when the two brought their police hospital forms to their area of jurisdiction, l [Nana Okobeng Amponsah] was informed that the consulting doctor told the two in a clear term that he was aware of the happenings in the previous hospital they had attended in the connection of their matter and that there are no ways that they would bring the police forms to the lower hospital for him to sign for the two,” Nana Okobeng Amponsah revealed.
Following this development, he noted that those two top personalities who are in league with the two miners had gone to look for another medical doctor in Takoradi and forced him to sign the police hospital forms for the two and wrongly stated in the forms that it is true that the two were shot by the gun.
“It has shown clearly that the levels at which this case has traveled attest to the fact that there no iota of truth in the case leveled against me,” Nana Okobeng Amponsah explained.
He dared that whoever may doubt that he was lying to the public should investigate the matter from the various police commanders including the police investigator at the Dominase Police station to unravel the truth of the matter.
He stressed that he was speaking the truth and that he cannot lie to Ghanaians since he is a loyal and law-abiding citizen of Ghana.
Articulating on the genesis of what led to the firing of the gun warning into the air, Nana Okobeng Amponsah noted that for the past months ago, when he went to his concession and fortunately he met the chief of Ampasie.
According to him, “he asked the chief that he was told that the chiefs in these communities were informed that if they had seen that the boats were in their areas are working on river Akonbra to cover the galamseyers to their illegal sites they would come to arrest them.”
He pointed out that he told the chief that when l am talking to you, the boat operators are still working on the river for which l heard the noises of the machines of the boats.
Nana Okobeng Amponsah indicated that the chief has responded that they had said several times to stop the boat operators to work on the water bodies but they realized that the place is a boundary between Gwira-Ampasie and Akango.
Nana Okobeng Amponsah said he invited a chief in the area called Nana Adu to accompany him to the area where the boat operators were working on the river.
He pointed out that they used a speed boat to the scene and upon reaching, realized that the activities of the illegal small-scale miners in the area were very terrible.
The illegal miners, he said, started pelting them with stones upon their arrival.
According to him, realising the danger posed by the pelting of stones, he fired warning shots into the thin air, ostensibly to scare them away.
He stated that after he fired the warning shots, he realized that the illegal miners were still throwing more stones at them.
According to him, they left the place but upon reaching home in the evening, he had a telephone call from police officers from the Dominase Police Station indicating that someone had come to lodge a complaint against “me that l came to fire gunshot at the mining site at Gwira-Ampasie and that they were hit by bullets.”
He added that Nana Adu was also invited to the Dominase Police Station to write his statement.
He said he was granted bail subsequently because the police asked him to do so, adding that the following day, he was at home when the Axim District Police Commander called him via telephone and told him that the Western Regional Police Commander said they should invite him to Sekondi
He said he drove his car to Senkodi and that when he reached Senkodi, the police officers told him that they had information that he had fired a gun at a galamsey site that had wounded some miners.
He said he responded that it was true that he fired a gunshot but he didn’t fire at anybody.
According to Nana Okobeng Amponsah, he showed his licensed gun to the police officers and tendered all the necessary papers covering the gun.
He said when he finished at the Axim District Police Command, the police officers told him that they would invite him anytime they needed him.
He said he was later informed by Axim police that the Western Regional Police Commander had directed that he should be processed for court.
He pointed out that he told the police officers he was ever ready to appear before the court and that anytime they wanted him to appear he would come.
He said he traveled sometime ago and on his return, he was told that the police officer came to leave a note for him.
According to Nana Okobeng, since then, he and his lawyer have appeared at court in Halfassini about four conservative times.
His accusers, he said, have however failed to appear in court since the case started, a situation that has caused the presiding judge to ask the police investigator in the case “where are the complainants?”
He stated that the CID officers told the judge that they had not seen them in court.
“Today, as l am talking l don’t know where the complainants in the case are,” he noted.
“I called the police investigator via telephone and asked him about the case, and the police responded to me that his Regional Commander has recalled the docket to Senkodi. And that the Commander has not given the court docket to them. And that they don’t even know whether we are going to court or not. l have since not heard anything about the case again,” Nana Okobeng Amponsah explained.
He has therefore called on the general public to disregard the media reports, saying that it is a calculated attempt to destroy his reputation.
