Thirty (30) people purported to be illegal miners have been trapped in a mining pit belonging to AngloGold Ashanti (AGA) pit at Anwiam, a suburb of Obuasi.

They are believed to have sneaked into the pit in search for gold on Saturday; however, the news of their being trapped came out just yesterday, October 18th, 2022.

‘Ghanaian Times’ reports that, the Assembly man of the Ahansonyewodea Electoral Area where Anwiam is, Mr. Donkor confirmed the news.

“Vincent Donkor, said that he was informed by some relatives of the victims at about 3am yesterday that their relatives have gone missing for five days after leaving their respective homes in search for gold.
Mr. Donkor said he followed it up to officials at the Security Office of AGA, who in turn asked that the matter be formally reported at the local police station for action.”
Ghanaian Times

According to the Assemblyman, security personnel of the AGA confirmed that the trapped people, sent a message to the security detail at the entrance to the pit, expressing their fear of arrest should they come out of the pit.

The Assembly man said he feared they will loose their lives because, they have been in the pit for five days and may have finished all their nourishments.

Meanwhile, at the time of the Ghanaian Times report, the Obuasi Divisional Command of the Ghana Police claimed they had not received any report yet on the issue.

Conversations on the Pit

The said pit is reported to have been left opened for about 12 years.

Chief of Okyekrom, Nana Amoako Gyanpah in an interview with ‘JoyNews’ said that, he had written to the mining company on several occasions about that particular pit.

“The company had neglected the pit about 12 years ago. I wrote a petition to AngloGold in 2020 to remind them that I and my community do not understand the reason why they have neglected it because there is a pit under my area so they have to come and reclaim the land (because) we needed the land for our local farming activities.
“Currently in 2022 I wrote another one still to no avail then I have to call the press and explain certain things within our own community to them,”
Nana Amoako, Gyanpah, Chief of Okyekrom

In response, Senior Sustainability manager for AngloGold Ashanti, Mr. Emmanuel Baidoo suggested that, since the land in question still belonged to AngloGold Ashanti, they reserved the rights to determining what happens to it.

“It is not a piece of land that has been relinquished to the community it is within our concession and it means we still have an interest in it…there could be a possibility of us going to remine because the ore belongs to the state and we have to ensure that it is mined and there could also be a possibility that it is part of our reclamation programme so we will cover it at this time.”
Mr. Emmanuel Baidoo

Morever, according to him, the company had paid compensations to farmers in the area for the lease of the land.

“We had compensated all farms in that area in relation to the mining activity there and the lease that we have,” Mr Baidoo said.

He didn’t quite see the threats the opened pit posed to the community as “the said pit is about 2.5km from the said community so it is not even close to the community.”