The MFWA deplores the brutal attack by illegal miners on Ohemeng Tawiah, assistant news editor of Accra-based Joy News, and urges the police to ensure justice for the victim.
Tawiah was assaulted on December 20, 2024, while in the company of a police team that had been dispatched to clamp down on activities of illegal miners in the Offin Shelter Belt Forest Reserve at Anwiafutu in the Ashanti region of Ghana.
He was following up on an earlier story he published on illegal mining in the area about the operations of Clean Jobs Resources Limited.
A report by myjoyonline.com, a news website of the Multimedia Group that also operates Joy News, says Tawiah sustained head and chest injuries, twisted fingers, and multiple cuts on his body after surviving a machete attack.
The miners who had initially fled the site following the police invasion, later remobilized, armed themselves and blocked the road, demanding that the police free their arrested colleagues and return their seized equipment, gold and guns, before allowing the team passage. They also demanded that all recordings of their mining activities be deleted.
They proceeded to deflate the tyres of the vehicles carrying the civilian escort, including the Joy News crew, and started raining stones on the buses. A stone hit Tawiah’s head causing him to bleed.
According to the journalist, who spoke to the MFWA on phone, the police and the Assemblyman for the area fetched the crew from the bus and deleted their footage as demanded by the mob as a condition for the team’s passage. Despite this, the irate miners continued to attack.
“They intended to severe my leg, but after hacking three times unsuccessfully, they decided to pelt me with stones,” narrated the journalist.
The journalist, who says he is recovering from the pain and trauma, told the MFWA that the police have informed him they are investigating the incident.
The MFWA condemns this barbaric attack on Ohemeng Tawiah and urges the police to ensure the arrest and speedy prosecution of the perpetrators.
