All Sixty two illegal small scale miners arrested for encroaching on the concession of Anglogold Ashanti in Obuasi have been released on bail. Their arrest last Friday, angered their colleagues who stormed the police station, prompting the police to fire tear gas at them to quell the crowd. The suspects were subsequently transferred to Kumasi but the Obuasi Municipal Chief Executive, John Alexander Ackon has secured their release. He told Joy News he did so for peace to prevail. “52 of them were released yesterday on bail. Ultimately, you do a security operation to serve a purpose. The law does not prevent people being given bail so there is no way it is going to affect anybody’s morale.” He said the Obuasi is currently calm. Meanwhile the Association of Small Scale Miners says those arrested are not illegal small scale miners and were not on their concession of Anglogold Ashanti as speculated. The Association’s Public Relations Officer, Francis Opoku has therefore questioned the motive of the joint police military operation. He said those arrested had nothing to do with the chaos and should not have been arrested.