Renowned business consultant Dr. Ishmael Yamson has delivered a scathing critique of Ghana’s leadership, warning that the unchecked destruction of the nation’s rivers by illegal mining, known locally as galamsey, represents not only an environmental disaster but also a “spiritual collapse.”
Speaking Tuesday at the opening of the University of Ghana’s 77th Annual New Year School and Conference, Dr. Yamson, CEO of Ishmael Yamson & Associates, urged the government to move beyond rhetoric and confront what he described as a culture of impunity. “No economy can survive when its environmental foundations are being poisoned for the greed of a select few,” he said.
Dr. Yamson expressed alarm at the scale of devastation, noting that Ghana’s major rivers once central to rural life are being polluted “in broad daylight, often with the complicity of those who must protect us.” He argued that the crisis transcends environmental concerns. “When a nation poisons its own water to feed the greed of a few, it is not just an environmental crisis; it is a spiritual collapse,” he declared.
Linking the galamsey menace to what he called a broader “crisis of values,” Dr. Yamson criticized the widening gap between public officials and ordinary citizens. He lamented that resources intended for social infrastructure are being diverted into private hands, leaving the average Ghanaian “helpless” as leaders “plunder the resources… while the few public office holders acquire huge and numerous assets and live offensive, ostentatious lives.”
From a business perspective, he warned that environmental degradation and lawlessness foster instability, deterring sustainable investment. “No country can build a sustainable, vibrant economy in a constantly disruptive and uncertain environment,” he cautioned, calling for the “iron will of execution” to enforce laws against illegal mining, regardless of political affiliation.
