A ranking member of the Mines and Energy Committee of Parliament, John Jinapor is skeptical about the work of the 9-member committee set up to investigate the Anto-Aboso quarry site explosion.
In his view, the committee report will only gather dust and will not be taken serious just like the Appiatse explosion report.
“My worry is that this investigation will generate a report that will gather dust and in about some few months or years to come, we will come back to discuss another explosion,” he said on Accra-based Citi TV.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Yapei/Kusawgu blamed the explosion on policy failure.
Mr. Jinapor wondered why the quarry company was allowed to operate without the requisite permit.
“I believe that we have enough laws and regulations, the problem is the enforcement. Certainly, this happened in a district, and to talk of a quarry, it’s not an underground activity so this idea that they were operating in the night baffles me. How did they get electricity, how did they get ECG to connect them to the grid? You might go and check, and you will be surprised to know that the District Assembly had been taking taxes and levies from this company” he noted.
He said he will be very surprised if this company has been operating without paying the assembly levies.
“It’s clearly a policy failure, it’s clearly an enforcement failure and impunity. Foreign nationals just come to Ghana and begin to do whatever they want, and when they are arrested, politicians have the audacity to tell us that look, there’s nothing to gain from prosecuting these foreign nationals,” he added.
Mr. Jinapor suggested investigations be handled at the national level since the region keeps recording explosion.
“Even with Appiatse explosion, nobody was prosecuted, no punitive measure, except the fine, then these foreign nationals believe that even if they break the law, what they will do is pay a fine. I’m not too sure this matter ought to be handled at the regional level. It should be escalated at the national level since this is not the first time we have witnessed this kind of explosion,” Jinapor opined.
This incident is the second explosion in the Western Region in less than two years, following a similar tragic event in Appiatse in January last year.
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