Gone are the days when shops and stalls were found only in markets. Today, every inch of the city seems to be occupied by one kiosk or the other.
These illegal structures are now competing with pedestrians for space on many of the city’s busy streets.
Citi News’ Nii Armah Ammah reported that, at a place like the Atomic roundabout in Accra, such kiosks have taken over the sides of the road.
The operators engage in all kinds of businesses including clothing, footwear, hair, phone accessories and provisions.
The streets of Osu roads have also not been spared.
On the Labadi stretch of the Accra-Tema Beach Road for instance, hundreds of kiosks can be found.
Francisca Abongo who has a little stall at a bus stop off the road reveals that she came there on the blind side of the authorities.
“My sister only spoke to the owners of the house behind us and they agreed to allow us sell here” – she said.
Francisca added that she had received several visits from the La Dade-Kotopon Municipal Assembly (LaDMA).
However, they come not to ask her to leave but to demand that she pays for a permit.
In a residential area like Cantonments, evidence of these kiosks springing up was also evident.
Data on how many of such unauthorised structures are scattered across the city is not readily available.
By convention, the municipal assemblies are supposed to plan for what purposes lands and spaces should serve.
The city authorities will have some explanations for the growing menace but all attempts to speak to them have proven futile.
An urban development planner, Kofi Kekeli Amedzro said that lack of proper of planning and regulation in the capital are to blame for this worrying development.
“When you are looking at the Greater Accra metropolitan area, there are certain places that do not have what we call local plans or schemes. They are just springing up without any development permit. If you look at it in terms of numbers, you realise that some of the districts don’t even have physical planners to plan these layouts,” – he said.
More experts have raised red flags about the emergence of such illegal structures at unauthorised places.
Despite being a nuisance by the clustered look they give our city’s roads, these illegal structures dotted around also tend to increase the number of casualties whenever an accident occurs.
Every now and then, city authorities embark on demolishing exercises to clear such structures, but without enforcing the laws, these structures continue to find their way back.
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By: Nii Armah Ammah | citinewsroom.com | Ghana