The state-owned Daily Graphic reported Thursday that at least 30 illegal miners were in the pit working when they were buried alive during the landslide at Dompoase, near Wassa Akropong in the Western region.
It said 18 bodies, 14 of them women, have so far been retrieved, but that rescue work is being impeded by lack of appropriate implements. Rescuers, including policemen, local people and other illegal miners, are working with shovels, bamboo stocks and bare hands.
A survivor, Gloria Ndzabah, 27, said the owner of the pit recruited 24 women and six men to work for him. She said while the men were doing the excavation, the women were carrying the rocks for processing.
Illegal mining is a booming business in Ghana and all efforts by successive governments to control it have been fruitless.
The owners of the illegal pits encroach on the concessions of mining companies, especially the big multinational ones, where they degrade the environment.
In 1989, the authorities tried to control the operations of illegal miners to check environmental degradation and collect revenue from them, as they were given the opportunity to apply for permits and restricted to surface mining since they do not have the equipment to mine underground. But the government's efforts have been largely rebuffed.
Accra - 12/11/2009
Pana
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