JJ’s Ridge House Back

Eleven months after devastating fire ravaged the Ridge residence of former President Jerry John Rawlings and his family, destroying all their personal belongings, the Ghanaian Observer (GO) newspaper can report that preparation works have earnestly started paving the way for the reconstruction of the gutted house.

GO can authoritatively report that workers using bulldozers and other construction equipments are seriously clearing the debris at the former residence of the former first family, apparently to ensure that the project is completed on schedule. Workers on site would not say anything when quipped about the work schedule for the completion of the new house as well as whether architects would maintain the original structure or there would be a change of structure and design.

A raging fire gutted the Ridge residence of the former President on Saint Valentine’s Day last year February 14th amidst loud explosions in the early hours of that morning.

The blazing fire and subsequent pall of smoke, which lasted several hours, also left behind mounds of ashes, debris, and smoldering personal belongings - the cause of which curious Ghanaians wait for the Ghana Fire Service to disclose.

Aside a wrapped wooden stool, a boxer’s punching bag and a few household items including a Ghana-must go bag, everything was devoured by the ‘merciless’ fire. After the devastating inferno, Mr. Rawlings spent the first night in Sogakope while his wife Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings and daughter Yaa Asantewaa, who were at home when the fire gutted the building, perched with her mother as government continued searching for a temporary accommodation for them.

But, months after no action of reconstruction on the house, a number of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) as well as other loyalists of the former President started mounting pressure on government to find befitting accommodation for Mr. Rawlings.

Government then announced that former President Rawlings and his family prefer to have their gutted residence at Ridge reconstructed and that it is awaiting the final design of the new house to be put up at the old place.

According to Information Minister, M r. John Tia Agologu, when this is done the government will bear the entire cost of reconstruction of a befitting residence for the former first family. Following these developments, the about 20 functional executive committee members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has met President John Evans Atta Mills over the issue.

Subsequently, controversy renovation works were carried out on the private residence of the mother in-law of the former President located at the Nyaniba Estates in Osu, Accra, to enable Konadu and her family to perch there after fire razed down the Rawlingses’ Ridge residence.