Speaking on The Point of View, he argued that illegal miners had already declared war on Ghana.

“The President and Commander-in-Chief should deploy the Ghana Armed Forces… in full-blown war and let us end all mining,” Mr. Ablakwa said.

When all mining is halted, the MP said we can then “see what kind of regime we will put in place.”

Further, defending the call for a moratorium on legal mining operations, he argued that “we should even be talking about nationalising our mineral resources.”

“The only way is for everybody to know that there is no mining any longer,” he added.

The government did place a ban on small-scale mining in 2017 as part of its bid to fight illegal small-scale mining.

The ban was lifted in December 2018 after over 1,300 small-scale miners were vetted and allowed to continue operations.