Accra, March 15 GNA - Mr Emmanuel Allotey, Chairman of Greater Accra Second-hand Spare Parts Dealers Association (GASSDA) on Thursday warned members not to hesitate in developing their plots at the 85.1 acre Anyah Light Industrial Area, which, he said, was under heavy threat from encroachers.
He said any further delay by members to move in to develop the site would make the whole resettlement exercise a failure. Allotey was speaking at a sensitisation programme organised by GASSDA in collaboration with the Business Sector Advocacy Challenge (BUSAC) Fund to educate their members to start relocating to their permanent site at Anyah.
He said the new executives when they took office on December 2005 made it their number one priority to ensure that the association do not loose any inch of land to encroachers at the new site and as such sought the assistance of the BUSAC to meet the various stakeholders to discuss the issue.
He said water and electricity, which were the main utility problems at the site, had been resolved and access roads were being constructed to link the main Anyah-Ablekumah and the Kwashieman - Ofankor road.
He said the association was facing multiple problems at its present location as a result of court actions by land owners, lack of space to operate thereby creating huge traffic on the Darkuman- Nyamekye road as a result of packing and dismantling of scraps on the main road and pavement.
Mr Maxwell Gyimah, Director, Okaikoi Sub-metro Assembly advised second hand spare parts dealers at Darkuman-Kokompe to prepare to move to their new site at Anyah since the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) was going ahead with its mass decongestion exercise of the city. "It would be better for spare parts dealers and mechanics at Kokompe to start preparing for their new site because the AMA decongestion exercise would cover all parts of the city".
Mr David Addo-Yobo, a Representative of the B.S Africa Limited, an advocacy firm which championed the BUSAC Fund said the fund which was initiated by DANIDA operated nationwide with additional support from the United Kingdom Department for International Development (DFIF) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). He said after submitting the technical and financial application in accordance with the funds requirement GASSDA was given a grant of 428,364,090 million cedis being 90 percent of the total project cost of 475,960,100 million cedis, while GASSDA was required to make available 47,596,010 being 10 percent of the project cost towards the advocacy to transfer GASSDA members to their new site at Anyah. 15 March 07
