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The former Head of Policy Monitoring and Evaluation at the Presidency, Mr Tony Aidoo, Wednesday accused former President J.A. Kufuour�s New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration of destroying Ghana�s only indigenous mining firm of international repute � The Ashanti Goldfields Corporation (AGC). According to Mr Aidoo, the NPP administration �destroyed� AGC by selling �the 25 per cent golden shares� that gave the government of Ghana veto over any corporate decision taken by the company. �At the end of the day, all our shares vanished into thin air. I was holding GH₵4 million shares� at the end of it, the value of my share was Gh₵4000. It was completely destroyed� he said, adding that it was irresponsible on the part of the administration to have disposed of the veto. Mr Aidoo, who was contributing to a discussion on �illegal mining� on Accra-based Joy FM, expressed the view that large-scale mining has not benefitted Ghana in any way. He said a comparative cost-benefit analysis would establish that mining has been counterproductive to Ghana�s prospects of industrialisation. According to him, large-scale mining has only led to the destruction of Ghana�s �arable agrarian� lands. �I believe that we are not getting anything out of mining,� he said, stressing that it was time the government did a cost-benefit analysis of the value of mining to the growth of the nation. �We should reduce the scale of an industry that does not give us value. We don�t get more than five per cent from mining related activities. At the time that they (large-scale mining companies) were making windfall profits, we didn�t even have the courage to collect our share.� Mr Aidoo went on to talk about the possibility of propping up illegal small-scale miners and getting rid of large-scale mining companies. He said: �Between those large-scale miners and small-scale miners, I�ll go for the small-scale miners and tell these foreigners to get out. �We have a natural resource that is not renewable, the more you take, the less we have. And I�m saying if you can get 10 per cent of the value (and we not even getting 10 per cent from these big, large-scale miners) and keep 90 per cent in the ground, we are better off.�