Find Who Hid the Akonta Docket, and You’ll Find the Truth About Galamsey,” – Prof Azar

Legal scholar and governance advocate, Prof Kwaku Azar, via a Facebook post on 7th October, 2025, has called for a thorough investigation into the mysterious disappearance and reappearance of the Akonta Mining docket, describing it as a defining test of Ghana’s resolve to end illegal mining and institutional corruption.

In a sharply worded commentary titled “Find Who Hid the Akonta Docket, and You’ll Find the Truth About Galamsey,” Prof Azar argued that the resurfacing of the long-missing file reveals how justice often grinds to a halt whenever powerful interests are implicated.

“The sudden resurfacing of the Akonta docket is a window into how law enforcement and justice grind to a halt whenever the powerful are under the spotlight,” he wrote. “Dockets do not vanish by themselves. They are buried, hidden, or made to disappear by human hands. And until we find those hands, our fight against galamsey will remain a charade dressed as a crusade.”

According to him, the controversy surrounding Akonta Mining Limited — a company allegedly owned by Ashanti Regional NPP Chairman Bernard Antwi Boasiako — exemplifies the deep institutional decay that has made the fight against illegal mining ineffective.

He recalled how, in 2022, the Lands Minister declared that Akonta Mining was operating illegally in the Tano Nimiri Forest Reserve, only for the President to publicly counter that the company was not involved in galamsey anywhere in Ghana. “The contradiction was never resolved and now we know why,” Prof Azar stated. “The very docket that could have told the nation who was right, who lied, and who must be punished was buried. Justice was not delayed; it was silenced.”

The outspoken academic warned that prosecuting the company without probing the disappearance of the file would only amount to “performance justice.”

“Prosecuting Akonta without also uncovering why the docket went missing is like patching a leaking roof while the foundation crumbles,” he cautioned. “Until we know who buried the file and why, any trial that follows risks becomes performance, justice staged for optics rather than rooted in truth.”

Prof Azar further argued that the missing docket exposes a broader pattern of institutional complicity, where power and influence shield wrongdoing and obstruct accountability.

“When a docket can vanish for years and quietly reappear only when the political winds shift, it tells us that galamsey is not just about shovels and rivers. It is about power and impunity,” he said.

He stressed that the real perpetrators of galamsey often operate far from the mining pits — in offices, not forests. “The true excavators wear suits, not boots. They dig not for gold but for cover. They operate not in the forest but in the offices where evidence sleeps,” he wrote.

Calling for an independent probe, Prof Azar urged that “every signature, every hand that touched it, every desk it passed” be traced.

“The missing docket is more than a lost file. It is a mirror reflecting how far our institutions have drifted from courage and how easily truth is traded for convenience,” he concluded. “Let the Akonta docket be our line in the sand. Until we find who hid it and why, we will remain a country that wages war on galamsey by day and protects its sponsors by night.”