The Ghana Water Limited (GWL) has assembled a collection of fictitious and inaccurate information in an attempt to dispute comments I made on PMExpress on JoyNews regarding access to water turbidity data.

The Fiction

In its statement of 17 August 2026, signed by its Managing Director, GWL asserted that it is “totally untrue that the Presidency [emphasis mine] has directed GWL to withhold river turbidity data”. That assertion is based on a fictitious and imaginary claim that I never made. I never said the Presidency was responsible for the inability of previously reliable GWL sources to provide me and my team with turbidity data.

I personally spoke to a few senior sources at GWL to obtain the data. One was emphatic that he could no longer provide us with the turbidity data because he had been victimised and warned not to share it. Another promised to look into it, but when I called to follow up a few hours later, he made it clear that he would not be able to provide the data.

One of the WhatsApp messages I received from a senior GWL official read: “I have been personally told to stay away from talking about galamsey. If I ask for this figure, it may bring me a problem later.”

So, was I told that the turbidity data could not be shared because of fear of victimisation and direct warnings against sharing it? The answer is an emphatic YES!

Was I told that the Presidency had directed GWL to withhold river turbidity data? The answer is an emphatic NO!

Did I attribute the inability of senior GWL staff to provide the turbidity data to a presidential directive? Again, the answer is an emphatic NO!

What I said—and what I stand by—was: “Today, when we tried checking, we realised that everybody else in Ghana Water Company told us something very clearly. They were very frank with us: ‘We can no longer give you the data because we’ve been told not to.’”

The assertion attributed to me in the GWL statement signed by its Managing Director is pure fiction.

More Fiction

Point 3 of the statement also asserted that “according to official records, Mr Evans Mensah did not visit the Kwanyako plant”.

I never asserted anywhere on PMExpress that I visited the Kwanyako plant. I called my regular contacts among senior staff and managers at GWL for the information. Again, that point in the statement was a response to a fictitious and imaginary claim that I never made.

I have attached the video of what I actually said.

The Tragedy

The real tragedy of the GWL statement is its strenuous effort to major in a minor—and a loudly misleading minor at that—in the face of the grave existential threat posed by galamsey, or illegal mining.

The statement had five main points, three of which were devoted to denying responsibility for recording and holding turbidity data. GWL claims that it only conducts turbidity tests during treatment to determine when to shut down plants after levels exceed safe thresholds. It then concludes that “the responsibility for managing and monitoring river bodies and holding turbidity data lies with the Water Resources Commission (WRC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).”

So, does GWL record turbidity data or not? The answer is an emphatic YES! Its own statement admits it. Whether the data is recorded on river bodies or at the headworks of its treatment plants is a red herring.

In any case, my comments on PMExpress were in direct reference to turbidity data recorded at the Kwanyako Water Treatment Plant. So, what exactly was GWL attempting to clarify?

The bottom line is that GWL records and holds turbidity data. It is that simple, and no attempt to mislead the public will alter this fact. This is especially important when we are talking about galamsey, the greatest threat to our collective survival as a people. GWL cannot be allowed to trivialise the matter.

The Evidence

GWL’s own evidence exposes the mischief in its statement.

Below is the official record of what GWL calls the “Water Quality Assurance Coagulation Test”, conducted on the Ayensu River [emphasis mine] at the Kwanyako Headworks. It is, therefore, palpably false to claim that “GWL does not hold official data on natural river bodies”.

GWL not only holds official data on river bodies and the quality of the water at its plants, but has also shared that data with JoyNews before.

On 6 September 2025, a team of JoyNews reporters visited the Kwanyako Headworks following GWL’s decision to shut it down because of unsafe turbidity levels caused by the activities of illegal miners.

GWL officers on site took the time to share with the JoyNews team turbidity records dating back to 2016, when turbidity was as low as 25 Nephelometric Turbidity Units (NTU). When we visited on 6 September last year, the turbidity level had risen to a catastrophic 94,800 NTU.

The evidence is contained in our recorded interaction with GWL officers at the Kwanyako Water Treatment Plant.

The evidence is clear: GWL has shared turbidity data with JoyNews before, as recently as September 2025. So why is it that, all of a sudden, GWL’s Managing Director is pointing to the WRC and EPA for turbidity data that GWL obviously has? Is it because GWL no longer wants to share its turbidity data? Would that explain why the senior officers I spoke to were unwilling to oblige, as they had so readily done just a year ago?

In fact, in 2024, GWL itself officially released turbidity data. On 30 August 2024, GWL issued a statement in which it formally reported the turbidity level of the Pra River, particularly within the catchment from which the Sekyere Hemang Water Treatment Plant abstracts water. It did so following a dangerously high turbidity reading of 14,000 NTU, which made it impossible to supply water to several communities in the Central Region.

I have reproduced that statement below to substantiate the point.

Again, it is factually inaccurate for GWL to suggest that it bears no responsibility for monitoring river bodies and that “the responsibility for … monitoring river bodies lies with the Water Resources Commission (WRC) and the Environmental Protection Agency”.

The Managing Director of GWL himself is on record as having authorised the deployment of drone technology to monitor river bodies for pollution by illegal miners. During a working visit to the Kwanyako Water Treatment Plant in September 2025, he was quoted as saying: “We cannot just report that turbidity is high without clear evidence of where the pollution is coming from. With drone surveillance, we can identify whether illegal mining or other activities are to blame.”

The fact that the WRC and EPA may have primary responsibility does not mean that GWL has no responsibility. What is clear to me is that GWL’s Managing Director is trying too hard to repudiate responsibility for turbidity data by making palpably misleading claims to justify doing so.

The galamsey war is simply too important to trivialise. As part of its contribution to that war, GWL must be transparent by publishing turbidity data from its treatment plants, as it did in August 2024 and September 2025.