Town Guards to assist police to control traffic

Accra, Dec. 29, GNA - Town guards are to be deployed to assist the Ghana Police Service, to ease traffic congestion at the Ga South Municipa= l Assembly next year. The guards would also check washing of cars on roads and other unapproved places.

The Assembly is also considering engaging the services of a towing company to pull away automobiles parked at road shoulders and other unauthorised locations.

Mr Sheriff Nii Otto Dodoo, Municipal Chief Executive made this known= on Tuesday, at the Assembly's Annual Ordinary Meeting held in Accra. "A careful look at the flow chart of Accra revealed that about 40 pe= r cent of vehicular movement is skewed towards our municipality and there i= s therefore the urgent need to map out strategies to manage traffic and vehicular movement within the municipality," he said.

Mr Dodoo said various locations had been identified by the Assembly to be developed into lorry terminals in line with government's Urban Passeng= er Transport Project.

Mallam-Kokroko, Santa Maria Last Stop, Sowutuom Last Stop, Gbawe Station, Ngleshie Amanfro and Anyaa have been listed to benefit from the project. Mr Dodoo noted that the Assembly was beleaguered with challenges tha= t include high incidence of encroachment on spaces earmarked for social amenities such as roads, schools, markets and lorry parks. "Indiscriminate sale of lands by some chiefs, underhand dealings by some building inspectors and members of the taskforce, refusal of develop= ers to comply with physical planning laws and regulations are some challenges=

facing the assembly," he said. Mr Dodoo stressed that inspite of the challenges, the Assembly was determined to strengthen the Works, Town and Country Planning Departments= in order to deal with unauthorised physical developments and projects as wel= l as to rid the municipality of illegal structures.

He announced that the Assembly had identified an abandoned quarry si= te at Ablekuma-Nsumfa to be acquired as a refuse disposal site. Mr Dodoo said as a short-term measure, the Assembly was in a proces= s of constructing 10 container placement centres in the municipality. He said the assembly within the year had served 4,795 summoned notic= es on public health offenders.

He said 23 of the cases had been prosecuted in court with seven pending. On the issue of governance and decentralisation, he said the Assembl= y would strengthen Zonal Councils and Unit Committees to ensure that good governance was administered at the grass root.

"Training of personnel will be the topmost agenda of the Assembly in=

2010. We wish to ensure that our staff obtains the requisite skills for efficient service delivery and I am happy that the 2010 budget has a vote= to support this initiative," he said.

Mr Dodoo said the Assembly would auction obsolete items, equipment a= nd vehicles that constituted a financial drain to the body. "As at November 2009, the Assembly had spent over GHc 26,000 on servicing and repair of vehicles and I think it is a burden on the Assemb= ly to continue servicing these vehicles. I hope resources from the sale of these vehicles will help support the Assembly's effort to purchase brand new ones for official assignments," he said. 29 Dec. 09