Operation Vanguard denies selling excavators

Leader of the Special Monitoring, Evacuation and Operation Team of Operation Vanguard, Nana Yaw Boadu, has denied allegations that his team sold excavators it confiscated during  their operations in the mining areas.
Vehicles and mining machinery seized during the activities of the operation Vanguard including excavators reportedly went missing from the site where they were kept.
Some owners of these vehicles have tracked the excavators and other vehicles to Navrongo, Beposo, Tarkwa Nsuaem and Tema with the help of tracking devices they had installed on the vehicles.
Speaking to sit-in-host for Atinka FM’s AM Drive, Nana Yaw Boadu explained that  such reports and complaints were the reason why efforts were being put in place to reserve one big site for the seized equipment and excavators.
“At a point in time, we received stories of missing excavators and decided to bring all of them together to make identification by owners easier,” he stated.
Meanwhile, convener for the Media Coalition  Against Illegal Mining, Mr. Ken Ashigbey, said the coalition is reliably informed that some of these excavators have been sold and are currently in Côte D’Ivoire.
“It is important that we get to the very bottom because our intelligence reveals that some of these excavators have even been sold in places like Côte D’Ivoire. So it is very important we get to the bottom of it and find out if any of the miners paid bribes and retrieved their excavators….We even need to investigate the District Chief Executives who were in office as at the time these excavators were missing because they represent the President in their areas”, he added.
According to him, it’s either these DCEs are incompetent or they themselves are compromised and are involved in this illegality.
 
Ghana | Atinkaonline.com | Vivian Adu Boatemaa