Songor Lagoon Under Threat

A few powerful men are wrecking untold havoc on the Ada Songor Lagoon with associated devastating environmental consequences.

The Lagoon produces a greater part of salt consumed in Ghana and in many Western African states including Togo.

Fishing activities have also been badly affected as water levels in the lagoon have dropped greatly driving communities along the lagoon into a state of desperation.

Private businessmen in connivance with local chiefs have demarcated portions of the lagoon and have grabbed huge swaths of lands around the lagoon.

As if that were not enough, with the aid of electric powered pumping machines, water is pumped out of the lagoon into dug out dams or dykes locally called “Atsiakpo” for the production of salt.

These dykes are owned by a few people and have driven many salt winners out of business. The poverty stricken salt winners then work on these dykes and win salt for the owners of the dykes at a cost of fifty Ghana Pesewas (50p) per bowl.

Rev. Sophia Kitcher, Secretary of Okor Songhor Women's Association has taken a swipe at the complicity of the local chiefs and clan heads in what she considers a crime and describes as “repugnant”.

“Our livelihoods have been destroyed forever and poverty has come to visit us again. Why must a handful of people forcefully take what must belong to everybody, ” she questioned with tears running down her face.

The phenomenon of “Atsiakpo” has also contributed in many ways to the destruction of the landscape and other living organisms in the soil.

The locals believe much of the problem will be resolved when the sandbar between the sea and the lagoon is removed. However the sums involved in the removal of the Sand Bar are huge and runs in the millions of Ghana cedis.

In 2011, a combined team of representatives from the Minerals Commission, Attorney General’s Department, the office of the Chief Justice and the Private Enterprises Foundation attempted to relocate communities and indigenous people along the Songor Lagoon for takeover by strategic investors but the move was met with stiff resistance.

“When they came, they asked us to move away from the lagoon and promised to give us alternative livelihood in farming and animal rearing and those who were interested in fish farming would be moved to settle along the Volta River” said Albert Apetorgbor of the Ada Songor Cooperative.

The cooperative is leading in the transformation of salt winning communities and is challenging the exclusive monopoly rights over the lagoon.

Dr Yao Graham, Chief Executive Officer of the Third World Network and a leading advocate of the National Coalition on Mining (NCOM) is beside himself with grief. According to him the problem around the Songoor Lagoon has to do with the push for large scale foreign investment as a strategy for the mining sector.

He said that in places where small scale activities like salt wining can thrive, they still find a way of bringing in foreigners to take over these activities.

Dr Graham said the evidence does not support the claim that large scale foreign investment will create jobs and develop the areas where the investments are made.

On 17th May 1985 armed policemen acting in concert with a private company raided Bonikope, a community along the Songor Lagoon killing Margaret Kowornu, a pregnant woman in the process.

Vacuum Salt Products Limited had alleged at the time that the inhabitants of the area had encroached on their portion of the lagoon allocated to them by the government.

A monument has been erected in memory of Margaret. The locals explain that that monument serves as an embodiment of their collective aspirations and imbibes in them a zeal to fight in defense of their heritage and the Songor lagoon.

Dr David Pessey a member of the Socialist Forum of Ghana has also described the state of the Songor Lagoon as a calamity of monstrous proportion and has called for a concerted effort to halt the “grab of the lagoon as a collective resource. He said “the quest for the maximization of profit has inebriated certain individuals who wield immense power and believe they can hold sway over the indigenous people.”

Dr Pessey expressed fear that an Environmental Impact Assessment will reveal that developments taking place around the lagoon are having a severe ecological impact on the immediate surroundings.

In the Ketu-Keta Lagoon area, Kensingtoon Industries Limited, a salt winning company entered the Dogbekofe area even before permission was granted.

The communities living along the Ketu-Keta lagoon were not consulted by the investors before the acquisition of the lagoon.

A MONUMENT ERECTED FOR MARGARET KUWORNU