‘Galamsey Queen’ in double trouble as Osafo Maafo goes under pressure

Ghana’s current Attorney General, Godfred Dame is no-nonsense man and is set to re-initiate prosecution of notorious Chinese lady, Huang En mostly known as Aisha Huang alias ‘Galamsey Queen’.

“Nolle Prosequi was entered by the previous Attorney-General. I take the view that we should re-initiate the prosecution”, Mr. Dame has told Citi News and said he has accordingly called for the docket of Aisha Huang from National Security.

Mr. Dame disclosed that his office would be prosecuting Aisha Huang in respect of her current alleged new offences as well as those for which she was on trial before her controversial deportation from Ghana in 2018.

She had been arraigned before court on May 9, 2017, for engaging in illegal small-scale mining at Bepotenten in the Amansie Central District in the Ashanti Region.

Aisha Huang was deported from Ghana to China in 2018 after she the state filed a Nolle Prosequi.

She was arrested this week after she was found to have sneaked into Ghana through an illegal entry point and was also found to have acquired for herself a Ghana Card although she has no official resident permit.

News of her reentry into Ghana and her arrest has sparked a public uproar and disappointment especially when it became public knowledge that her Ghana Card was issued to her on a Sunday, raising questions of its authenticity and which officials may have colluded with her.

Even in the year 2018 when she was deported after Government had entered a Nolle Prosequi, many Ghanaians had publicly called for her to be jailed rather than deported.

The public anger was based on the fact that illegal small scale gold mining locally called ‘galamsey’ has become a national concern that has destroyed many water bodies in the country and devastated thousands of hectares of arable lands.

At the time of her deportation, the then Senior Minister, Yaw Osafo Maafo rubbished the public criticisms of the decision and he insisted that the deportation was in the best interest of the Ghana.

Yaw Osafo-Maafo, by then, said jailing Aisha for engaging in illegal mining was not important as it was not going to solve Ghana’s economic problems.

This same Osafo Maafo has come under very heavy public outlast after news broke that his Aisha Huang had sneaked into Ghana and was once again involved in some illegality.

He has since been under pressure to state publicly whether on hindsight, he still stands by his position that the Galamsey Queen should not have been jailed but deported and left to return to Ghana to engage in another illegality.

This was what exactly Osafo Maafo said about Aisha Huang and her deportation in 2018:

“We have a very good relationship with China. Today, the main company that is helping develop the infrastructure system in Ghana is Sinohydro, it is a Chinese Company. It is the one that is going to help process our bauxite and provide about two billion dollars to us.”

“So when there are these kinds of arrangements, there are other things behind the scenes. Putting that lady (Aisha) in jail in Ghana is not going to solve your economic problems. It is not going to make you happy or me happy, that’s not important, the most important thing is that she has been deported from Ghana…”

“…I am saying that there are many other things beyond what we see in these matters and everybody is wide awake, the most important thing is that we have banned this, we have established regulations and we are protecting our environment. That is far more important than one Chinese woman who has been deported out of the country”.

SECURITY VICTIMIZATION

Meanwhile, the Director of the Faculty for Academic Affairs and Research at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, Prof. Kwesi Aning has cautioned against the victimization of security personnel who arrested Aisha Huang.

Prof. Aning spoke with Starr FM on Tuesday:

“I want to say kudos to the public officials who arrested this woman and her accomplices. Let me state very clearly that I am hoping that they are neither demoted nor transferred for working in Ghana’s interest.”

“Aisha Huang is a strategist and a businesswoman who seeks the interest of her own country. When as a sovereign state you allow a foreign agent to come into your country to undertake activities that are not only detrimental to your future stability welfare and development but actually posses an existential threat to the State and these people. Then those Ghanaians who make it possible for the Aisha Huangs of this country to destroy our water bodies, ground soil with chemicals that come through the food chain threatening our exports, particularly cocoa, our international relations with Ivory Coast, those Ghanaians must be treated for who they are. Treasonable individuals whose actions are fleecing the state and its future.”

 

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