"World Bank" Wants FM station

REPORTS AVAILABLE to The Chronicle indicate that there is growing hue and cry among residents in the southern parts of the Volta Region over government?s inability to extend radio stations and other communication facilities to the area.

The Chronicle?s own assessment of the situation is that the grumbling and attendant tension emanating from a significant geographical segment of the ?World Bank? of Ghana?s politics provides anti-establishment sentiments, which could have far-reaching implications for national cohesion.

This paper has gathered, after a three-day tortuous trek through the region, that the residents are in a total darkness, not only over the government?s policy, programmes and activities on various sectors of the economy, especially agriculture and fishing, since these are the chief occupations of the residents, but also in education, enlightenment and information that radio affords a people.

The Chronicle?s interaction with chiefs, catechists, traditionalists, opinion leaders, social workers, market women, youth groups and religious leaders in the southern Volta showed how depressed and worried they were over the long delay by the Frequency Board in giving them an FM station.

?We are in total darkness regarding government policy.

We tune in to a few stations we are able to receive in these parts of the country, but there is none we can listen in, in our own community that would help us in terms of education. We need to know what is actually going on and the things which directly affect us as a people,? most of them lamented to The Chronicle.

?We have heard and learnt about our area receiving an FM station soon, but till now, nothing has been done. Is it a ploy to keep us perpetually in the dark?? Another exclaimed.

As the residents cry out, the opinion leaders, religious leaders, chiefs and newsmongers were still in dilemma over where to pin the blame- the government or the Frequency Board.

Currently, along the southern part of the Volta region, precisely, the coastal parts, there is no single radio station, be it private or public.

From Akatsi, Dabala, Anyako, Alakple, Fiaxor, Dzita, Savietula, Whuti, Anloga, Woe, Dzelukope, Keta among others, the people don?t have a single radio station, let alone an efficient telecommunication system. The only accessible system, which is very costly for the residents, is a radiophone.

This paper can report that, from the areas visited by our team, the communication centers were countable on one?s finger.

One opinion leader has this to tell The Chronicle, ?Look, even if we want to inform the public about pressing needs, we need to send a gong-gong beater across the length and breadth of the various communities before we can push a message through. Sometimes, if the gong-gong beater gets tired, he leaves the assignment unattended to. That is why we need radio stations. Why is the government playing that trick on us??

According to him, the MP?s policies were also kept in the dark, since there were no effective ways of communicating information to them.

?In fact, if the government or whoever is responsible for these vital social services is dragging its feet in ensuring that we get radio stations and telecommunication facilities, then we should stop shouting on the rooftops about extending telecommunication system to all parts of the country.

?I can tell you that in this whole area, we have only GBC at Ho and Volta Star with one at far away Sogakope called Comboni Radio. How and why are they frustrating our leaders from getting at least one for us to ensure that we are educated on sensitive issues like how to reduce the growing TB epidemics, mortality rates, HIV/AIDS and other related diseases which are in the forefront of government?s agenda? Very bad,? he stressed.

Mr. Fiakeye Cudjoe, a head teacher of Salo L.A School, also expressed dismay at how the region was lagging behind in terms of radio stations and communication gadgets.

He noted that the rate of school drop outs and teenage pregnancy would be reduced if there was a radio station through whose channels prominent leaders, MPs, ministers of the gospel and other opinion leaders would be able to educate and explain issues to the people, especially the farmers, fishermen and market women.

According to him, the number in enrolment of pupils had drastically reduced due to peer pressure, lack of parental care, poverty and others.

At Alakple, The Chronicle spotted only one clinic and one communication centre, which had lately closed down. Residents explained how they found it difficult assembling people to share vital information on social issues affecting them and the nation.

Rev. Frederick Mawuenyega Lawluvi, Moderator of the Southern Presbyterian Church of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Ghana, described radio as ?sine qua non? and called on the authorities involved to help grant the region a station so that much could be done to help make the teeming communities in that part of Ghana more aware, hence, more a part of the nation.