The Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, has disclosed that the government has initiated a comprehensive review and audit of all public lands sold in recent years to ensure that due process was followed.
Speaking during a visit by Vice President Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang to the Ministry, the Minister said the exercise is aimed at protecting public property and ensuring value for money for the state.
According to him, any transaction found to have breached laid-down procedures or left required processes incomplete will be nullified.
He explained that the review follows growing concerns that some public lands, originally acquired by the state for specific purposes such as agriculture and development, were unlawfully sold or mismanaged by officials entrusted with their protection.
He warned that officials found culpable would be publicly named and sanctioned to deter others. The Minister stressed that all the land sales are being scrutinised to confirm that proper valuation was conducted and that due process was strictly adhered to.
“We began the processes of reviewing. One of the things that we all heard is that public lands that the government had taken for specific purposes, some for agriculture, somehow, the people who had been given the charge to protect these lands were abusing them.
“We constituted a team led by my able Deputy, and we got cabinet approval to address that. By the time we finish, it will not cross the mind of any government official to take public lands because we will publish your name in every newspaper.
“All public lands that had been sold are going under review to make sure there is value for money, and a process audit was done. Processes that didn’t finish are automatically cancelled. We are going on to ensure we implement it later to give confidence to the people of Ghana that we are going to protect public lands,” he said
The Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Emmanuel Armah Kofi Buah, also announced plans to comprehensively overhaul Ghana’s mining legal framework, as part of government efforts to sanitise the sector and promote responsible mining practices.
Armah Kofi Buah further disclosed that amendments to the Mining Act are currently being finalised and will soon be presented to Cabinet and Parliament for consideration.
According to the Minister, the proposed reforms are designed to align existing laws with emerging realities in the mining sub-sector, with a strong focus on formalising and expanding cooperative mining as a sustainable alternative to illegal operations.
“In the mining subsector, we want to operationalise the Mining Act. We are completely overhauling it, and it is on its way to the Cabinet and then to Parliament to amend the laws in line with the new measures we have introduced.
“People are mining everywhere because they do not know where the gold is. We are working with the Ghana Geological Survey Authority to identify mineralised areas so that we can organise cooperative groups for responsible mining,” he added.
