Residents of Ablekuma Manhean in the Ga West municipality of the Greater Accra Region have staged a fierce protest against the government over the dilapidated state of their roads.
They burnt vehicles tyres and blocked major roads, making human and vehicular movements impossible.
According to Citi News‘ Phillip Nii Lartey, the visibly angry residents say they will not rest until their demands are met.
They said they will continuously burn tyres on their roads to register their displeasure especially as the situation has persisted for over a decade with several unfulfilled promises from the government.
This is not the first time residents are staging such a protest.
In May 2017, hundreds of residents in the municipality were left stranded as the Ablekuma-Manhean-Afuaman and Oduman-Nsakina roads were blocked by angry residents and drivers.
The protest saw commercial drivers park their vehicles and refused to pick passengers.
Four years ago they took part in a massive demonstration which lasted for about 12 hours over the same issue.
Meanwhile, the Municipal Chief Executive of the Ghana West Municipality, Clement Wilkinson, in an interview with Citi News said the road had been awarded on contract to a contractor who has started work.
He however added that the contractor had commenced work at a portion of the stretch and was gradually executing the project.
He said the pace of the project has slowed due to the onset of the rainy season.
“They have the right to demonstrate and we do appreciate what they have done so far… All what the people want is for the roads to be fixed. The contractor is on it working right now as I speak, we have about 18 km around which the contractor is working on. It is the rainy season, so whatever you do right now, the road becomes bad at a certain point. Even as I speak, there is a machine on the road fixing the road to put it in a motorable state.
Mr. Wilkinson however revealed that the contractor had been given up to the end of 2019 to complete the project, indicating that funds have been made available.
For the past 2 weeks, we have been doing something on the road, but we are starting from somewhere. Where they [the demonstrators] are now, we will get there soon… It is a Government of Ghana project, they have prepared their certificate and I’m sure it won’t be long they [contractors] will be paid. By the end of 2019, they would have to finish.”
He therefore appealed to the aggrieved residents and demonstrators to exercise patience as efforts are made to speed up the project.
I’ll tell them to exercise patience. We are working for them.
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By: Jonas Nyabor/citinewsroom.com/Ghana
