by Johan Zongo
Introduction
Ghana’s rise as a global leader in gold production has fueled a rapid surge in economic activity, urban development, and foreign investment. Yet, beneath a glowing image of progress, the nation is grappling with a darker reality: a stark dichotomy, where growth and prosperity are closely accompanied by environmental degradation, corruption, and social inequality. Nowhere is this paradox more evident than in the country’s struggle with galamsey—a local word for describing illegal, small-scale gold mining. It is a practice that has not only scarred Ghana’s landscapes but also polluted its rivers, devastated agricultural lands, and undermined the health of its communities. The process frequently involves the use of mercury and cyanide to extract gold, contaminating freshwater sources with toxins and chemicals that can persist for more than a millennium. In galamsey-affected regions, waterborne disease cases increased from 980 per 100,000 people in 2021 to 1,180 per 100,000 in 2024.
In the pursuit of economic expansion, Ghana’s natural resources have become battlegrounds. Rivers run brown with mercury and cyanide, forests are stripped bare, and fertile lands are left hollowed out and lifeless. The promise of wealth has drawn numerous actors, from poor local artisanal miners to Chinese investors, into the informal mining sector, creating a cycle of environmental destruction and social instability. Galamsey has ravaged over 19,000 acres of land across seven regions in Ghana, and the country loses more than $2 billion annually to gold smuggling, undermining the formal economy. This cycle of entropic expansion and decay—of the duality between forces of growth and collapse—now poses a fundamental question for Ghana: Can the country find a way to balance its economic aspirations with the preservation of its land and people, or will it continue spiraling toward environmental ruin and inequality?
Activism in Ghana: A Fight Against Structural Oppression
In August 2024, the discourse surrounding galamsey took a more dynamic form as Ghana witnessed a surge of activism. Citizens, young and old, took to the streets to demand action against the galamsey crisis, armed with signs that read “Free the Citizens”, “Greed Destroys Nations”, and “Gold for the Few, Destruction for the Many”.
Among the voices leading these protests was Oliver Barker-Vormawor, a Cambridge-educated lawyer and activist whose bold strategies and thought-provoking rhetoric have placed him at the forefront of Ghana’s civic movement. For Vormawor, activism is not just about challenging the status quo but also about grappling with the delicate balance between disruption and harmony.
The Nature of Disruption
As an activist who has often been accused of crossing the line, most recently criticized for removing the key from a police vehicle at an anti-galamsey protest, Vormawor acknowledges the complexity of organizing disruptive protests, admitting that there is no surefire way to gauge how they will be received. “Protests aren’t usually for majority support. Sometimes they may be intentionally provocative,” he explains. For him, disruption is a tool that carries inherent risks, including alienating potential supporters.
“One always runs the risk of being in a situation where you are never sure what it is that gets the population to tick or reflect on an activist differently. I am an extremely doubtful person on whether anything we do is the right approach, and that’s okay too,” says Vormawor. This tension, however, is one he views as necessary; one we must assume: “Otherwise, we’re stuck in paralysis.”
In the wave of activism that swept Ghana, Vormawor’s protests have often targeted the state, which he holds as morally responsible for the systemic failures that allow crises like galamsey to persist. “My activism and demand for action is turned primarily towards the state,” he says. For him, structural reform must precede meaningful individual change.
He critiques the state’s deflection of responsibility, as seen in its response to the #fixthecountry campaign with the counter-slogan #fixyourselves. “If that is what you truly want, you must mandate a framework for Ghanaians to be able to fix themselves,” Vormawor argues.
Challenging Structural Oppression
Vormawor does not mince words in his critique of governance failures in Ghana as observed in handling galamsey: “Ghana is structurally oppressive,” he states, pointing to the nation’s failure to uphold its commitments to freedom and justice in meeting protests with police brutality. In drawing a distinction between police brutality in the US and in Ghana, he states:
“I think one of the things, from my own experience living in the US, about the benefit of policing in America is that it gets the spotlight so much that it’s always in our faces and gets us to have a conversation about the police. There’s a huge community of intellectuals that are reflecting on policing because it is so dramatized in the media.” This, he believes, is lacking in Ghana.
He argues that the state has a social commitment toward freedom and justice and to ensure people the basic necessities of life. He highlights that this is baked into the country’s DNA in three ways:
- The National Anthem states that we must “resist oppressive rule”
- The Coat of Arms says we are committed to “freedom and justice”
- Article 36 (2)(e) of the Constitution states that “the most secure democracy is the one that assures the basic necessities of life for its people”
Yet, Vormawor holds that Ghana is “structurally oppressive” because “We have not dealt with the oppressor in the room.”
The Future of Democracy
When asked about the future of democracy in Ghana and in similar African countries, Vormawor states that “The reduction of democracy to voting is my biggest source of anxiety.”
He argues that there exists a widespread notion of democracy as fulfilled after voting is held, as if voting is the sole prerequisite to an effective democracy, which is incorrect. In his view, democracy continues even after the vote. Understanding that people who are elected need to be held accountable is an essential part of democracy. To him, Ghanaians need to have a high level of engagement with policies in order to produce change.
Vormawor urges young Africans, particularly those in universities, to reclaim their role in shaping the continent’s narrative through intellectual engagement and critical thought. “It feels to me that academia has checked out of the conversation” he says in response to the lack of engagement with the galamsey crisis in higher educational spaces.
He laments that academia, both in Ghana and abroad, often seems disengaged from pressing societal challenges like galamsey, and calls for a deeper commitment to analyzing and addressing these issues. “What we face now in Ghana has had no equivalent in the past, however, we are not seeing people reflect on this deeply; there is not enough being written in Ghana and in global institutions. Whether we accept it or not, our role is to translate the continent intellectually,” he emphasizes, in advocating for African thinkers to take ownership of their narratives and foster solutions that align with their own expectations. “We are not begging to be saved by the West; we are engaging our society in a way in which it can live up to our own expectations.”
Ghana’s Galamsey Crisis: A Systemic Problem with Systemic Solutions
Bright Simons, a leading Ghanaian policy advocate, believes the galamsey crisis represents more than just environmental degradation—it is a symptom of systemic governance failures, disjointed policy-making, and a cultural epistemic divide. “ Our epistemology is different from that of the west. Accuracy is less valued than in the west. We are more holistic people,” he states. Simons critiques the lack of reliable mining data, describing how motivated reasoning and holistic perspectives in Ghanaian culture often prioritize interests over factual accuracy. “For the average Ghanaian, just narrowing down to factual accuracy does not add much value,” Simons explains, highlighting that debates are frequently resolved through appeals to interests, making them interminable.
On Protests and the Disconnect Between Policy and Politics
Simons offers a sobering critique of Ghana’s political system, where a sharp disconnect exists between activism and policy-making. Unlike in Western democracies, where protests often influence policy through integrated mechanisms, in Ghana, politics and policy operate in separate spheres. “In the U.S., politics and policy are so intertwined that if you heat up politics, you can change policy,” Simons explains. “In Ghana, a lot of policy work is done independently of politics. There is a bigger gulf between politics and policy. What happens is that if you heat up protests, the channels to convert that into sustainable policy making are not there, because often, the conjunction between those who engage in political activism and those in policy is not due to a policy connection.”
This disconnect, Simons argues, undermines the impact of protest movements. “You can raise the temperature with massive protests, but the channels to convert that into sustainable policy-making are missing,” he says. He points out that Ghana’s policies are often driven by donor agencies, consultants, private interests or even the World Bank rather than local political platforms. For instance, sanitation policies are influenced by businesses like Zoomlion rather than public discourse. “Anger doesn’t last,” Simons cautions. “If anger lasts beyond a certain period, it becomes bitterness.”
In contrast to Vormawor’s view, protests from Simons’ perspective have limited efficacy in Ghana, functioning more as tools to draw attention than as levers for change. Simons believes that without robust mechanisms to connect protests with policy-making, sustainable reform remains elusive.
On Governance Reform and Accountability
Simons identifies Ghana’s governance structure as a key obstacle to effective policy implementation. “Our government infrastructure is balkanized,” he explains. “People in government can do whatever they want because there’s no feedback loop to regulate their actions.” Unlike in countries with robust think tanks and elite-focused outlets that hold policy makers accountable, Ghana lacks mechanisms to evaluate and enforce policy performance. “In America, a massive report that comes out detailing failures can damage a policymaker’s reputation. Here, we don’t have that,” Simons observes.
The lack of accountability allows policy failures to accumulate without political consequences. “There’s a broken link between policy performance and electoral outcomes,” Simons says. “Individual policy decisions aren’t examined until they aggregate into broader national crises.” He points to the failure of the Gold Kacha program as a case in point, noting how its collapse received little scrutiny despite its huge potential to address the galamsey crisis.
Simons argues for a governance model that incorporates feedback loops to ensure policymakers are held to account. “We need mechanisms that allow specific problems to be identified and addressed effectively,” he says. Without such reforms, the policy failures fueling crises like galamsey will persist.
On Advice for Aspiring Advocates and Thought Leaders
To young Africans, especially those in universities, Simons offers a clear message: focus on local problems and take ownership of your narratives. “Set your own fights and fight your own battles,” he says, urging young scholars to think critically about Africa’s unique challenges. He points out that while global issues like climate change dominate international discourse, Africans must not ignore pressing local crises like galamsey. “Think local. We don’t have much influence on the global scale so we should not ignore the micro-environments–– this is a metaphor for everything else,” Simons emphasizes.
Simons also calls for greater intellectual collaboration among African scholars, noting that the continent’s rapid urbanization and population growth rates present both challenges and opportunities. “We need to see more thought leadership,” he says. “Discuss ideas, write, and collaborate.”
Simons’ critique of Ghana’s intellectual landscape highlights a profound “crisis of praxis,” where change agents—including academia, protest movements, and the policy community—fail to converge around actionable solutions. While both commentators point toward a certain kind of disconnection between theory and practice, this is different from Vormawor’s view of academia having “checked out”. Rather, Simons argues that academia is “fractured” in a way that diverts from avenues where knowledge can generate genuine policy change—a gap that must be bridged in order to fully equip the country to tackle crises like galamsey. For Simons, this gap is most visible in the inability to innovate or critically engage with policy missteps, such as the flawed implementation of the Gold Kacha technology. Though the Gold Kacha program was initially paraded as a Ghanaian innovation, Gold Kacha was actually repurposed South African technology, sold to the government at inflated prices without robust academic scrutiny or grassroots accountability. He highlights this failure as one that underscores the absence of a cohesive intellectual ecosystem—one where academics could conduct R&D on sustainable mining solutions, protest movements could amplify systemic inefficiencies, and policy actors could implement evidence-based strategies. “How come academia, the protest movement, and the policy community haven’t been able to work together to denounce this mess and push for creative and sustainable solutions?” He questions.
Ultimately, Simons believes that solving crises like galamsey requires a shift in attitudes, stronger governance mechanisms, and a commitment to intellectual engagement. “We must think together and act together,” he says. “Galamsey is a symptom of bigger systemic issues, and addressing it requires systemic solutions.”
Conclusion: Balancing Growth, Governance, and Responsibility
Ghana’s galamsey crisis reflects a deeper struggle—a rapid expansion of economic ambitions followed by environmental collapse and systemic failures. From the streets where activists like Oliver Barker Vormawor raise their voices, to the policy arenas critiqued by Bright Simons, the battle against galamsey is not just about mining. It is a fight to align Ghana’s governance, culture, and societal values with sustainable progress.
Activism has drawn critical attention to the crisis, highlighting structural oppression and the disconnect between politics and policy. However, as Simons underscores, protests alone cannot drive change in a system where vested interests and broken accountability mechanisms dominate decision-making. To bridge the gap, Ghana must develop governance structures that integrate environmental management, local empowerment, and technological oversight.
The path forward also requires young Africans, particularly in academic spaces, to take ownership of their intellectual and societal narratives. As Vormawor and Simons both urge, there exists tangible solutions, rooted in critical thought, collaborative action, and a commitment to holding leadership accountable.
Finally, Ghana’s struggle with galamsey is a microcosm of broader challenges facing Africa: the need to balance economic growth with environmental stewardship, and the imperative to transform governance into a tool for collective progress. By learning from her failures and fostering a culture of accountability, Ghana can lead the way in proving that disarray is not destiny—and that collapse can, with the right systems and people in place, lead to renewal.
Johan is a sophomore in Ezra Stiles College. He can be reached at johan.zongo@yale.edu.