The plight of the people in Upper West Region

Upper West region was usually described as the youngest among the ten regions we had at the time. Today, the six newly carved out regions has seized the popular adjective "youngest" used to describe the Upper West Region.

The Upper West Region is deprived of significant developmental projects. Some of these projects include well-established hospitals, schools, roads just to mention a few. Lack of these projects pose health, financial, educational, psychological and emotional challenges to the indigenes of the region, the reason behind the high level of poverty, child mortality, road accident and other social vices.

Armed robbery which was alien to the people of the region for sometime past is now at its crescendo resulting in limited movement under police escort at certain time. What have we done to deserve this? It is unfortunate to have our movement limited in a democratic country like Ghana when we are not under curfew.

The health of the people in the region has been in jeopardy for sometime now. Health facilities in the region per my description, are miniatures and semblance of health facilities. The seeming regional hospital is no exception of my description of health facilities in the region. This problem has resulted in high numbers of preventable deaths in the region.

The worst of it is that the Upper West seeming regional hospital does not have an ambulance to aid the mobility of dying patients to better hospitals in other parts of the country to save their lives. This has raised an alarm and call for natives' intervention. This resulted in a group of natives championing the crusade of "Operation Buy Ambulance".

This group went to market women with cup in hand begging them to give any amount that each person could contribute, even if it was 50p in the Wa market. The group has also extended its cup in hand to some dignified personalities living within or without Wa town. What kind of leaders do we have in Ghana? They are only good at misplacing priorities. It is a shame as a nation!

Very worrying and heartbreaking among all is the deliberate delay of the president, Nana Addo, to commission the newly constructed ultra-modern Wa regional hospital. The former president of Ghana, H.E John Dramani Mahama, promised the good people of the region a one hundred and sixty capacity (160) ultra-modern regional hospital when he saw the status of the regional hospital at the time.

Having torched by the plight of the people in the region, John Mahama cut sod for the building of the regional hospital. Being honest, committed and true to his words, he supervised the construction of the hospital to its completion when he lost power in the 2016 elections. The reason why he was not able to commission it.

One would have thought that by now the regional hospital will be in operation to save people's lives but that is not the case. For which reasons children and parents still have to be admitted on the bare floor in the seeming regional hospital when a new one is completed, one can not tell.

Probably for political expediency and discrimination against the Upper Westerners, president Nana Addo and his government remain adamant to the plight of the people in Upper West region, denying us our right to quality health care services.

The one hundred and sixty (160) capacity ultra-modern hospital has everything it takes to ameliorate the worst health services delivery to the people of the region. The new hospital equally has the potency to recruiting thousand's of indigenes which would have eliminated or drastically reduced the high level of poverty, thievery, armed robbery and other social vices in the region.

Wa Airport was one of the major projects John Mahama executed prior to the 2016 elections. He undertook a complete rehabilitation exercise on it which makes it qualified to be commercialised to operate for domestic purposes. Again, JM was voted out in 2016 so he could not commission it. Commissioning this has become another serious headache for H.E Nana Addo so they engage in deceiving Upper Westerners with the actual date of commissioning. The people of the region have been deceived on several occasions regarding the commissioning of this same airport.

The minister of aviation was in the region to assess the state of the airport and fixed a date for its commissioning. If that date has come, then it is today.

The deputy aviation minister also came to the region and promised that the commissioning would be done in two weeks times. That time has not come yet. We only hope that the promise made by the president to the regional house of chiefs on 8th May, 2018 will not be one of their usual deceptions.

The over delay in commissioning these completed projects among other important projects were the things that propelled the Upper West regional house of chiefs to make a clarion call on the President on 8th May, 2019 to come to the aid of the people in region. We pray and hope that the president honour his promise.