Security-Health Nexus: Why it must never be Politicized along Partisan lines (2)

Rev. Msgr. Prof. Stephen Ntim  

Mistrust in State institutions

What is the point? Unlike Colonial and Pre-independence days of Political mistrust, we now have a democratic dispensation governed by constitution and codified legal framework. State institutions, such as the Security Forces, the Electoral Commission, etc. paid by public funds, are over and above partisan political process.

These institutions by their mandate should never be the sources or causes for mistrust to give any political party ‘a good reason’ to create vigilante groups to protect their political interest.

How long can we continue to tolerate a proliferation of these groups especially during elections to protect their partisan interest at polling stations because of lack of trust of the Electoral Commission?

Events of the last couple of months and especially since the handing-over to this new government are enough to make us sit up and stop this illegality and lawlessness. In 2008, similar lawlessness of party unemployed youth who were sympathetic to the then new NDC government behaved no less different from what we are witnessing seemingly from NPP youth.

It was heartening to Ghanaians, when the President Nana Akuffo Addo in his Easter goodwill message reiterated his commitment to law and order and promised Ghanaians that lawlessness and anarchy cannot in any way be allowed under his watch.

The President cannot do it all by himself. Legal and state institutions and those paid to work in these institutions need to fulfil their statutory mandate before partisan affiliations.

Unless we got rid of excessive political partisanship, and allow state institutions to work with dispatch to win the trust of Ghanaians in the political process, political parties would continue to create more paramilitary groups which would be inimical to our collective stability. Any government that is in incumbency owe Ghanaian electorate the social protection of security – and our personal and collective stability cannot be sacrificed on the altar of partisan politics.

Illegal mining and our health

The same applies to health. This whole issue of galamsey is not unrelated to health, the ecosystem and our survival. From the angle where some of us are coming from, namely, religious perspectives, the need to protect the environment is essentially a theological issue.

Humans are only stewards of God’s creation. As stewards, humans are duty bound to protect creation for posterity. Therefore, Mother Nature and its resources need to be used with some level of circumspection. Human survival on this planet earth is contingent upon ensuring that we do not over use and deplete nature. Is not on record that our natural resources upon which much of our economic activity and indeed our livelihood depend are being depleted at an alarming rate?

It is estimated that more than 50 percent of the original Ghanaian forest area have been cleared for annual cropping. Consequently, crop yields have stagnated. Productivity has declined due to rampant soil erosion. Products such as fish, and forest products as timber and non-timber forest stocks are on constant decline.

In the dry season our coastal towns face severe shortages of water. Health related issues such as air pollution, water pollution and other sanitation issues continue to rear their ugly heads. Irresponsible depletion of our natural resources is not unrelated to serious health threats. Especially critical is water pollution caused by a change in its composition due to human activity.

Through the hydrological cycle, water evaporates from the sea and is precipitated on land – rain, hail (and snow for temperate climates).This is stored in the ground as groundwater (which is ultimately discharged into waterways) or if it cannot be absorbed, it returns to the sea through run-off.

Thus, when land is polluted, the probability of our water bodies also being polluted is very high. Much of the pollution discharged – deliberately or accidentally – onto the land or directly into waterways will ultimately find its way to the sea where it will also affect marine ecosystems.

This is some of the extent of havoc irresponsible use of resources can cause to the ecosystems. When these discharges are not stopped, treated or properly managed we are in deep health risks. In short, once humans continue to deplete nature without some restraints and disrupting the ecosystem, it is our very survival that is at risk.

Cost of unguarded environmental degradation

Additionally, at the socio-economic level, the GDP growth we want to achieve as a nation can be threatened, if we examined this galamsey and the environmental degradation menace from a more philosophical and broader perspective: when we measure our nation’s productive base in terms of human, natural and social capital and not simply as growth in GDP, our achievement might probably be less than we think we have accomplished.

For example, estimates of the cost of environmental degradation by experts show that 10 percent of our GDP is lost annually as a result of unguarded environmental degradation.

Given this scenario, this call to regulate and control the illegality of small scale mining need not be politicized along partisan lines. The over-politicization of critical national issues cannot lead us anywhere.

Of course, what this rationalization of small-scale mining also means is that the political leadership needs to find alternative jobs to ensure that those who economically depend on this ‘galamsey’ find substitute jobs before we end up adding to the number of armed robbers.