Wontumi trial: PW1 admits he has no documents tying NPP chair to Samreboi mine
Testifying for the State, artisanal miner Michael Gyedu Ayisi said under cross-examination that his claim that the concession had been passed from Mr Antwi Boasiako, popularly known as Chairman Wontumi, to one Henry Okum was based entirely on what Okum told him.
The first prosecution witness in the criminal trial of Ashanti Regional NPP chairman Bernard Antwi Boasiako has told the High Court in Accra he cannot produce a single document showing the Samreboi concession was assigned to a third party.
Testifying for the State, artisanal miner Michael Gyedu Ayisi said under cross-examination that his claim that the concession had been passed from Mr Antwi Boasiako, popularly known as Chairman Wontumi, to one Henry Okum was based entirely on what Okum told him.
Asked by counsel whether he had ever sighted a deed of assignment or any official concession paperwork indicating that Chairman Wontumi had transferred mining rights to Okum, Ayisi replied:
“I have not seen any document.”
He further conceded that he had never in his life seen a mining concession document, did not know the exact boundaries of the Samreboi concession and had received no formal training in mining, saying he learnt the work “on the job”.
Ayisi was giving evidence in the case in which Chairman Wontumi and two others are standing trial for allegedly permitting mining on the Samreboi concession without the necessary authorisation, in breach of Ghana’s mining laws. The NPP regional chairman has pleaded not guilty.
The witness, who described himself as an administrator and supervisor under Okum at Samreboi, earlier adopted his witness statement dated 6 October 2025 before Justice Audrey Kocuvie-Tay. In that statement, he said he oversaw mining on unworked parts of the land and supervised reclamation and coconut planting on previously mined portions.
Under questioning from defence lawyer Andy Appiah-Kubi, Ayisi admitted he had never met Chairman Wontumi in person and had never seen him at the Samreboi site, noting that his only familiarity with the politician was from television:
Despite that, he maintained that locally the concession was regarded as belonging to the NPP chairman, insisting that in Samreboi “even a child knows” the land is for Chairman Wontumi.
Ayisi also told the court he had on several occasions extracted gold from the site and handed it over to Okum, but was unable to give figures for the quantities involved or how often this occurred.
