Danger is looming in Bowire in the Afigya Kwabre District of the Ashanti Region following the recent quarry dynamite explosion by K.K. Quarries Limited, a multi-national stone quarry company in the area, causing damage to lives and properties.

The disturbing commercial activities of the Chinese quarry company which had been posing serious health risks to the population of over1,500 residents, Today understands, are being done on the blindside of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Minerals Commission and Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources.

The aggrieved affected residents have threatened to institute legal action against KK Quarries Limited to enable the company pay compensation for damages and also ensure that due diligence is done during the blasting process.

Residents have also complained that the activities of the stone quarry company have affected their health and livelihoods, and thus called for the halting of what they described as “irresponsible” quarry activities of the company.

Speaking in an interview with Today via telephone on Thursday, November 30, 2017 Assemblyman for Bowire-Akrowa Electoral Area, Mr Isaac Kwabena Kokroko, and the Bowire Unit Committee Chairman, Mr Yaw Twumasi, accused the Chinese quarry company of destroying their community through its commercial quarry activities.

The two personalities claimed that the company’s activities, especially its constant dynamite explosion, were negatively polluting the community, resulting in the destruction of building structures in the area. They alleged that school buildings and houses including the Family Care Hospital and water bodies were being destroyed by the company since its commercial operation in 2016.

Both Mr Kokroko and Mr Twumasi described the situation as “disturbing trend” and called on the officials of the Environmental Protection Agency, Minerals Commission and Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, John Peter Amewu, to prevent the company from any further explosion.

They therefore, called on President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to, as a matter of urgency, set up a commission of enquiry to institute a full-scale investigation into the activities of the company.

According to them, they find it extremely difficult to understand why the company has been allowed by its god fathers in the area to continue to engage in irresponsible quarry operations. Additionally, Mr Kokroko and Twumasi noted that the heavy-duty machine crashes big rocks as trucks cart away stones to different destinations.

“Rock dust can be seen rising in the air and the noise of the crashing stones indicates that you have now entered the mines. “…the quarry is right on the hospital exposing us to flying stones, loud noise of the crushers, dust and stones being thrown on the hospital that put fear and panic in the patients. The quarry should be closed off to reduce the noise and destructions in the area,” Mr Kokroko and Twumasi stressed.

However, several attempts by Today to get management of K.K. Quarries Company Limited to respond to the allegations proved unsuccessfully.