Face-Saving Demolition

The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) has been in action for the past few days, pulling down structures occupied by those Frantz Fannon described as The Wretched of The earth.

It is one of the latest in a series of bids to exonerate the wobbling assembly from possible culpability in the cholera outbreak that has hit Accra – the worst in living memory.

The most egregious of them all was the presence of the president in a gutter, shovel in hand, as though clearing the filth from the drainage.

Unfortunately, many of us have read between the lines and concluded rightly that it was nothing but a futile exercise to court favours of disappointed Ghanaians – a journey to nowhere.

Yesterday, the slum which was built over the years at a portion of the Accra beach – Mensah Guinea – near the Arts Centre, witnessed a massive demolition by the AMA.

The structures, an assortment of tired wood and rusty roofing sheets, have housed persons from various walks of life. One common feature cutting across them is poverty and a persistent struggle to make ends meet.

Little wonder they engage in all manner of activities to bring bread and butter to the table. Their bodies have built resistance over the years to the common diseases as they nightly lay their heads in a place where hygiene is a stranger, with rats and mice scampering for pieces of leftover food. That is not to say that they are totally immune to the ailments associated with the absence of basic hygiene.

Unfortunately, officialdom has rarely turned its attention to them: they have been left to their fate.

What we have in this slum, a mini settlement, are human beings who only attract the attention of politicians when elections are due. They are the target of cheap gifts when their votes are needed.

It is not election time and so the AMA Chief can afford to order his demolition gang to descend upon them with all the force at their disposal.

We appreciate the importance of taking drastic measures to hold at bay the mounting incidence of cholera, but these should be undertaken with a human face and a large dose of reasonableness.

Knee-jerk action such as the one being unfurled at the spot under review is a mark of desperation by authorities who have failed to discharge their statutory duties of providing safe environments for the people.

Poor slum dwellers; they are being sacrificed by the AMA Chief whose ineptitude at post has combined with poor sanitation habits of Accra residents to offer cholera the impetus to spread dangerously.

Given the existence of other slums in the city, especially Agbogbloshie and others, we are surprised that the face-saving action is not being replicated in these places.