Alleys and streets in Aflao are increasingly becoming dangerous as thugs dispersed by persistent Police swoops on their hideouts are attacking and robbing transit travellers waiting for the border to open.
Most of the attacks reported occurred around the Timber Market and the Lorry Park during the early hours of the day.
Victims of the more than 10 attacks reported to the Police in June were foreigners from sister states of Benin, Cote d'Ivoire and Nigeria.
In a story corroborated by the Police, a local source told the Ghana News Agency that the robbers waylaid their victims, waiting to continue their journey and others who go into dark alleys to urinate.
The source said the robbers, who move in groups of four and five snatch bags containing money, mobile phones, passports and other valuables from their victims.
What is more baffling is that the public does not heed to shouts for help by the victims, probably, for fear of the thugs, the source said.
Chief Inspector Frimpong Manso, in-charge of Aflao Police Station, said on June 1, two Ivorien drivers, who were in transit, called at the station at dawn with abrasions and said while sleeping beside their vehicles along the street, five robbers armed with pistols and knives attacked them and took 30,000 CFA from them.
He said on June 23, a Togolese woman also reported at dawn that she had been attacked while, on her way to the toilet and robbed of 350,000 CFA, a mobile phone and passport.
Chief Inspector Frimpong said there were several other attacks that were not reported to the Police because victims were in a hurry to continue with their journey.
He said most of the victims who reported failed to stay to assist the Police in their investigations.
Chief Inspector Frimpong said no arrest has so far been made but said the clamp down on the criminals would continue until they were flushed out from the streets of Aflao.
Aflao is Centre for Aids, Travellers Cautioned
Travellers who embark upon pleasure and voyeuristic adventure to Aflao need to exercise extreme and cautious restraint.
This is because the eastern gateway town has more AIDS cases than any other town in the region.
The Ketu District Chief Executive, Linus Coddman Koffie, gave the painful warning when he addressed Keep Fit clubs from the Volta Region at Aflao.
Statistics available to the Chronicle shows that between January and December, last year, 308 cases were reported at Aflao with 113 patients being Togolese.
Between January and June, this year, 110 cases have so far been recorded with 43 coming from neighbouring Togo.
Mr. Koffie said the geographical position of Aflao as a border town has attracted many travellers from every part of the country and West Africa, especially businessmen and all manner of people, including tourist, thus making the town always agog with heavy human and vehicular activities.
He made a passionate appeal to the youth to tone down the amorous desires since they are the most vulnerable, adding that the AIDS awareness is not the case for the government and the hospitals alone.
The DCE further asked community based organisations and NGOs to intensify their education on the AIDS menace.
Koffie announced that a ?900 million standard stadium complex would be built at Aflao Tokor to promote sports in the district.
He appealed to both young and old to embrace the keep fit concept as their contributions to the government's efforts to make the people strong and healthy for national development.
The chief administrator of the National Sports Council, Albert Agbozo, said his ministry will not relent in its efforts at promoting sports throughout the country.
He expressed the urgent need for the observance of personal hygiene and environmental cleanliness and asked sportsmen and women to change their social habits.
The immediate past president of the Volta Region Keep Fit Clubs Association, Jones Kublenu, observed that lack of recreational and other sporting activities has compelled people to resort to drinking as a form of entertainment.
He called for an end to the singing of profane songs during keep fit training periods since it does not augur well for the building of discipline and decent society.
Presently, there are 22 clubs in the association which cuts across the entire region.
Mr. Emmanuel Ankora of the Premier Keep Fit Club, at Ho, has been elected the new Regional Chairman with Jones Kuwornu of JAWS Keep Fit Club, Denu as his ice.
Mr. G. V. K. Gedzeve of Hohoe Keep Fit Club is the secretary. For the first time in six years, this years keep fit games was sponsored by Nestle Ghana Ltd. with a further promise to help in future celebrations.
The General Secretary of Mass Sports, Joseph Nyamador, decorated the executives of the association with beautiful sports council emblems.
