AMA Loses Battle

A traders at Lapaz

THE Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) appears to be losing the battle to decongest the city by removing street hawkers and traders selling on pavement and unauthorized places.

This new dimension is a clear indication that promises by AMA boss, Alfred O. Vanderpuije, to ensure that the decongestion exercise under his tenure continues without being a nine-day wonder is turning to a mirage.   

The hawkers have now taken over payments and major streets in the city and have even extended their activities to other areas.

Some of the new areas where the hawkers have taken their illegal activities to are the centre of the main road leading to Alajo, pavements along the main road in front of the Ghana National Police Training School, Lapaz lorry station, among others.

Some of the areas where the hawkers are returning to in their numbers include the Central Business District of Accra, the Kwame Nkrumah Circle, and the Kaneshie market.

When DAILY GUIDE spoke to some of the hawkers, who are giving AMA boss a tough time since his assumption of office in May, one Madam Akosua Baduwaa, a second hand clothes seller said she sees no reasons to quit her hawking as the Assembly itself is not serious to make the city clean.

According to a mobile phone seller, who gave his name as K. K., initially, he tried to abide by the directives of the Assembly but he later realized that both the NDC government and the AMA is not prepared to address the issue of filth in the city.

“So my sister, why is the Assembly trying to decongest the city by dragging only hawkers away and shirking its responsibility to clean the said areas? We understand that we can never fight the government but we are waiting till the day AMA would be seen clearing all piled refuse from these areas and also see them disilting several chocked gutters,” he said.  

K.K reiterated that if AMA is not prepared to tidy the city, there is no essence in preventing hawkers from selling on the roadside.

It is barely two and half months since AMA evicted traders from commercial centres in the national capital, but traders selling all manner of items such as second-hand clothes and bags, jewellery, edible items among others, have once again taken over the bus stops and the pedestrian walkways at the Central Business District of Accra and other areas.  

At Lapaz, the situation is worse as most hawkers were on Monday, August 17, 2009 seen putting up new structures with the aim of hanging their wares.

The traders who are now returning to the said places in their numbers are conducting brisk business in the full glare of security guards stationed at vantage points to drag them away.

DAILY GUIDE identified that some of these traders have adopted the strategy of taking positions along the main roads and hiding their items in polythene bags to avoid being caught by the security guards.

When DAILY GUIDE visited AMA to get its side of the story, nobody was willing to talk, explaining that Mr Vanderpuije had traveled outside the country and had ordered the staff not to handle any issue regarding the decongestion exercise.   

AMA, on June 29, this year, embarked on decongestion exercise in parts of the metropolis during which officials of the assembly, assisted by personnel of the Ghana Police Service, Ghana National Fire Service and Prisons Service, demolished illegal structures at those areas.

The exercise was welcomed as it reduced human and vehicular traffic in the central business district.    

By Stella Danso