President of the Small Scale Miners Association, Michael Kojo Peprah has issued an unqualified apology to the Office of the President over an unsubstantiated allegation.
This followed claims he made that vehicles used by some Chinese illegal miners popularly referred to as ‘galamseyers’ have stickers with the Office of the President logo embossed on them.
Michael Peprah however beat a hasty retreat in his latest interview during which he praised the government for the efforts it is making to go beyond the deportation of galamsey kingpin Aisha Huang to include prosecution.
The latest development, he said, has convinced him the government is showing enough goodwill, especially with the directive from the Attorney General.
Notorious galamseyer, Aisha Huang, who is known severally as En Huang and Ruixia Huang and was deported from Ghana about four years ago, was rearrested after allegedly entering the country with forged documents.
Her arrest sparked reactions and the discontent that followed her deportation in 2018, rather her prosecution resurfaced, with the President of the Small Scale Miners Association being one of the vociferous critics.
Michael Kojo Peprah had claimed Aisha Huang returned to Ghana six months after the then Senior Minister Yaw Osafo-Maafo had told the nation of her deportation in 2018 and added the spurious allegation about the Office of the President.
However, the president of the small-scale miners association made a U-turn during an interview with Kumasi-based Luv FM and recanted his accusation against the Office of the President.
“I made some statements about the Office of the President and I wish to retract and then apologize.
“This is on the issue related to claims that there are some Chinese kingpins involved in illegal mining and that on most of their cars you see this Office of the President’s sticker embossed on the vehicles.
“I want to categorically retract and apologize to the Office of the President and to all the security agencies in the country”, he apologised.
Mr. Michael Peprah praised the government, particularly the National Security and National Intelligence Bureau (NIB), formerly known as Bureau of National Investigation (BNI) for fishing out the notorious Chinese galamsey kingpin for prosecution.
Meanwhile, the Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Mr. Godfred Yeboah Dame has served notice that his office will be prosecuting Aisha Huang for committing various mining offences in the country.
