Editorial: Cecilia Dapaah Must Act Now!

Despite the harm that floods are causing this country, especially in the urban cities of Accra, Kumasi and Takoradi, Ghanaians seem not to be learning any lessons. Private developers continue to build on waterways with careless abandon. Yesterday, the Ghanaian Times reported a similar story from Kumasi, where a private developer was captured reclaiming part of the waterlogged lands surrounding the Islamic secondary school in Kumasi.

According to the story, though the Deputy Minister for Water Resources Works and Housing, Mrs Cecilia Dapaah ordered the developer to stop work, he only stopped for a brief period and resumed work immediately the Deputy Minister left for Accra. When a Gas station exploded in Kumasi sometime ago and resulted in death and injuries to several people, we suggested to the government to enact laws that would punish civil or public servants whose negligence causes harm to others.

We made the suggestion because we thought when the Gas station in question was being built in an unauthorised place, if the supervising agencies had been responsible and stamped their authority, then we would not have witnessed the Gas station tragedy. Those who are conversant with the geography of Kumasi would agree that the Islamic Secondary School is just along the road leading to Barekese from Abrepo Juction. There is no way officials at the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA), Lands Commission and Town and Country Planning can give alibi that they did not see the developer reclaiming the land.

Definitely, they all saw the illegal reclaiming and development of the land, but they looked on unconcerned until the Minister came all the way from Accra to stop him, albeit for a short moment. The Chronicle thinks this attitude by civil and public servants who are being paid by the taxpayer is not helping in the forward march of this country. Some few years ago, a land developer was seen reclaiming parts of the lagoon between Sekondi and Takoradi, in the Western region.

Despite the fact that this illegal act was being perpetrated near a major road linking the two cities where top government officials pass everyday, nobody saw anything wrong until the Graphic camera man in Takoradi took pictures of the scene which was published, before the developer was asked to stop work by the powers that be. If government officials were punished by law for failing to do what is expected of them, they would begin to sit up.

For the time being we call on Mrs Cecilia Dapaah to cause investigation into the matter, to ascertain whether the developer has a permit to what he or she is doing. If the developer does have permit, there must be further probe to ascertain the one who issued him with the permit. Chronicle thinks if this procedure is followed, it would help to expose officials who encourage developers to disregard building regulations.