The National Anti-Illegal Mining Operations Secretariat (NAIMOS) has reaffirmed its commitment to the fight against illegal mining, describing the campaign as a marathon that requires sustained efforts to remove illegal mining equipment and infrastructure from Ghana’s water bodies.
Colonel K.S. Appiah, Director of Operations at NAIMOS, said the secretariat remained determined to dismantle structures and equipment used for illegal mining despite the operational and logistical challenges confronting its task forces.
Speaking to the media on Thursday, October 22, 2026, Colonel Appiah warned that abandoning enforcement efforts would allow illegal mining equipment to remain in rivers, worsening the environmental damage caused by the practice.
“As has been mentioned on many occasions, the fight against illegal mining is a marathon, and we are poised to go through this race to ensure that we take out all illegal mining infrastructure on our river bodies,” he said.
Colonel Appiah acknowledged that removing illegal mining equipment from rivers was a difficult task, particularly because of the size and weight of the machinery and the challenges involved in accessing some mining sites.
He explained that task force personnel were sometimes compelled to dismantle or burn makeshift mining platforms and chanfangs because transporting them out of river bodies was difficult.
According to him, some of the affected locations lack accessible roads for trucks and other heavy-duty vehicles, making the removal of the equipment particularly challenging.
“It is very difficult to move them out of the rivers because road access and access for trucks to the areas are almost impossible. So, we need to destroy and burn them, and later, in coordination with the GSDC, which has the capability to lift them from the river bodies,” he said.
Despite these challenges, Colonel Appiah maintained that NAIMOS would continue its operations to remove illegal mining infrastructure from rivers and intensify efforts to protect Ghana’s water bodies from further environmental degradation.
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