‘Expect more Zongo development this year’ - Mustapha Hamid

With the Zongo Development Fund Secretariat now fully functional, the Minister for Inner City and Zongo Development, Mustapha Hamid, has said key development agenda expected to be executed within the various Zongo communities will take off this year.

Prior to being reshuffled to the Ministry, he noted, that efforts were underway to secure the needed office accommodation while boosting the staff strength among other legislative procedure to get the Zongo Development Fund Secretariat running.

But, with this done, he explained that most of what is expected of the Ministry and the Fund would be realized this year.

Dr. Hamid said the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, envisages the Ministry to be a policy guiding one while the Zongo Development Fund is committed to implementing what has been put on paper for the Zongos.

“In any case, a lot of the work that the Fund will also do will depend on the requests that will come from the various communities,” he stated.

However, he added that the President through his economic and social development programmes captures a broad vision for the development of the Zongo communities.

The Minister, who said these in response to a question on the work of the Ministry this year at the launching of the “Zongo for Peace and Development (ZOPAD)” Conference 2019, in Kumasi, observed that this President’s vision includes some infrastructural development; development of human capacity; sanitation; security among other interventions.

According to Dr. Hamid, already a number of communities have submitted their requests for various interventions, which are expected to be met this year.

At the launch of the maiden programme, ZOPAD, which is expected to be held on January 8, 2019, in Kumasi on the theme “Developing our Zongo Communities through Tolerance and Peace,” he indicated that it is an initiative of the Ministry mooted by the former Minister, Boniface Abubakar Saddique the support of Cabinet.

It is aimed to engender and foster peace and unity among residents of Zongo communities in Ghana.

He said the Ministry was set up to engender development and bridge the gap between inner cities and Zongo communities and the rest of the areas of the country.

“So even as we seek to bring development to Zongo Communities, we realized that it is also correct and indeed, our duty to ensure that those developments sit securely on a foundation of peace.”