Market women raise concerns on Makola reconstruction

The Accra Metropolitan Assembly would embark on the reconstruction of the Makola Market and the Rawlings Park in the Greater Accra Region to give it twice its present capacity in the first quarter of 2016.

Currently, the Makola market alone has about 6,036 traders while the traders at the PWD market are about 1,500.

The project, expected to commence during the first quarter of 2016, aside market stalls would have administrative offices, day-care centres, clinics, underground car parks, paved grounds, drainage and water harvesting facilities.

Others facilties are temperate control rooms, sanitation points, warehouses, restaurant services, transit accommodation for traders, alternative solar power source, police and fire stations, shops and space for financial institutions.

Mr Robert Ansah, the Head of the Market Reconstruction Project and Special Assistant to Mr Alfred Vanderpuje, Mayor of Accra, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, gave the assurance that all registered traders at the market will be allocated with their spaces upon completion of the project.

He said the planned capacity of the new markets would be twice the current capacity of the markets tagged for reconstruction.

He stressed that the project was scheduled to commerce before the end of the first quarter of 2016 and that currently, the Assembly was working on releasing the advertisement for tender within the next two weeks.

“Since this project is under the Public Private Partnership arrangement (PPP), the government is calling on all private institutions to submit their tender bid for the project,” he added.

Madam Mercy Afrowa Needjan, the President of Ghana Markets Association appealed to the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) to ensure that they stuck to their promise of ensuring that all the registered traders in the respective markets earmarked for reconstruction were allocated with their stalls before any other allocations were made.

She said though the AMA has suggested a payment plan that would allow the market traders to pay for the new stalls in a 10-year installment plan, the new prices ought to be moderate.

She also called on the AMA to expedite the reconstruction activities so as to help the traders improve on their sales since the redevelopment would make the markets more attractive to consumers.

“The markets definitely need a facelift to make it more attractive and we are in full support of the project, however, we hope the project will not be delayed when it starts since that would put most of the traders in a more stressful situation,” Madam Needjan said.

She suggested that while the reconstruction works were ongoing, the market could move to the Public Works Department (PWD) car park and the car park opposite the Economic and Organized Crime Office (EOCO).