People of Bawku make merry over lifting of curfew

Bawku (U/E), Sept. 19, GNA- Bawku was thrown into euphoria last Tuesday following the announcement by Mr Hackman Owusu Agyemang, Interior Minister, that the curfew in the area has been lifted.

Soon after the pronouncement car horns tooted all over the streets while residents especially the youth embraced each other in excitement. However, most married women in Bawku town were apprehensive about the new development saying that they no longer have the full attention of their husbands whom they suspect would take to nocturnal activities once the curfew is over.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency at Bawku, most residents expressed relief that after nearly three years of curfew they are free once again to live normal lives. They said the long curfew had adversely affected business in the area and worsened their socio-economic status.

Some of the youth who were interviewed resolved to reciprocate the government's gesture by refusing to play into the hands of opinion leaders who might want to use them for activities that will bring about violence.

They expressed their preparedness to co-exist peacefully and to channel their energies into productive ventures for Bawku to regain its former glory as the region's leading business centre.

Chief Superintendent of Police William Kofi Twumasi, Bawku District Police Commander, told the GNA that joint police and military patrols in the area will continue despite the lifting of the curfew to ensure that miscreants, who may wish to throw the area back into chaos are apprehended and brought to book.

He appealed to opinion leaders to refrain from attaching ethnic connotations to every act of indiscipline by other groups and that they should advise their kinsmen, particularly the youth, to be law-abiding. Bawku and its environs were placed under curfew following an ethnic conflict between Mamprusi and Kusasis after 2000 general elections.