Dr. Solomon Owusu, a Communications Team Member of the Movement for Change, has taken a swipe on persons arguing that the Ashanti Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Bernard Antwi Boasiako, also known as Wontumi, is being intimidated.
He has discarded the assertion that the NDC government is persecuting Wontumi, but rather, he is facing the consequences of his ill actions.
According to him, Wontumi should have been punished long ago for the harm he caused to the environment, but was shielded by the then NPP administration, and now facing the punishment for his deeds.
“Wontumi is being charged for polluting our water bodies and mining without license permits,” he said on TV3’s BigIssue on NewDay Wednesday, May 28, 2025.
Mr. Owusu’s comments followed a remark by Dr. Joshua Jebuntie Zaato, a senior lecturer at the Political Science Department at the University of Ghana, who said Wontumi was being persecuted because the NDC is in power.
According to him, the government is repeating the ills of the erstwhile NPP administration, which he says is a means of avenging the opposition for what they did to them whilst in government.
“What the NDC and the current government is doing today is pure vengeance from the past,” he claimed.
But Mr. Owusu contended that the Wontumi is facing what he should have faced long ago.
He reminded the Political Science lecturer of his own actions against illegal mining in the past, which he says is in sharp contrast to the current government’s actions against persons indulging in the act.
“Have you forgotten when you yourself were demonstrating against this same galamsey? And now that this government is doing what he needs to do to stop it, you’re now complaining?” he wondered.
The discussion follows the arrest of Chairman Wontumi and subsequent detainment by the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) on Tuesday, May 27, 2025, following allegations of his involvement in illegal mining and forest entry.
It’s time Wontumi paid for the ills he’s committed against the nation – Tanko-Computer
With additional files from Melody Ataa Dora
