"Galamsey" hits Teshie

Small-scale miners, popularly called 'galamsey' operators, have invaded Teshie, a farming community in the Bawku West District in the Upper East Region, to prospect for gold discovered recently, causing extensive damage to the environment.

The miners, who are working without permission, harass the people and landowners each time they attempt to prevent them from operating. The presence of the galamsey operators has also cause prices of goods and services to go up. For instance, transport fair from Teshie to Zebilla, the district capital, a distance of about five kilometres, has increased from 600 cedis to 1,000 cedis and the price of coca cola from 1,500 cedis to 2,500 cedis.

Most of the youth, mainly schoolchildren, have abandoned the classroom to join the invading galamsey operators to search for the mineral. Teshie has rocky terrain and is surrounded by mountains with little land for farming.