A Letter To Nana Akufo Addo`s Government On Behalf Of Graduates Of  Spatial Planning In Ghana

I deemed it necessary today to write on behalf of all Human Settlement Planning (Spatial Planning) Graduates in Ghana after seeing the students I taught as a Teaching Assistant during my service time at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in 2014-2015 academic year graduated yesterday (05/07/2017). When I first heard they were graduating I became so happy and started jubilating. However I thought of the current situation and the aftermath of national service and became sad.

For they are about to face the ugly truth that jobs that they thought were waiting for them like the other professional courses like Medicine, teaching, etc are not available. In school we were told Planning was a professional course and therefore were made to go through a lot of troubles just to understand the course and what awaits in the job field as spatial planners. But these young graduates dreams are going to be crashed and they would become frustrated about the situation, that is what hurts me, they should have been told the hard truth in school so that they could prepare for it.

Occasionally and especially during disasters, I do hear people complaining and saying that where are the Town planners? Who are supposed to plan the country to avoid such calamities. Those planners are at home unemployed, wasted and frustrated. Those planners are sorry to the President of Ghana for not practicing what they learnt due to unemployment. Those Planners are sorry to the citizens of Ghana for not championing their welfare and allowing them to die through disasters.

Those Planners are sorry to their role models, teachers and lecturers for not coming out with the best designs that can change the outlook of Ghana and protect its citizens as they promised. Above all those planners are sorry to their families for not being productive and self-fulfilling. They are sorry to the districts without planners and the Town Planning head who has no power to request for qualified planners to fill those empty offices so as to make mother Ghana proud even though he is aware that there are no enough planners in the system working to achieve the sustainable development goals.

Most of the problems in Ghana has to deal with the use of space. The water and sanitation issues Ghana is struggling to control could have been better off if each district had planners responsible for ensuring safety, harmony, aesthetic, etc as are some of the principles of spatial planning. But Planning is not important to Ghana and the president as we were thought by our lecturers to believe. With well developed and implemented plans some diseases and disasters could have been avoided. Ghana could have become beautiful and people would have feel safe and happy just like the developed world which understands Planning and its important. But since Ghana prioritize management to avoidance/prevention who am I to argue.

Mr president of the republic of Ghana, If you want Ghana to progress then you need to be ready to engage only qualified personnel and I do not see how a psychologist is qualified to work at the Town and Country Planning Department. Only Planning students and those who study Geography to some extent have knowledge of issues of what happens at Planning offices. When there is clearance for employment of town planners all Planning graduates wants the list to be made of only qualified graduates who did Planning and Geography to some extent and nothing else. With that the rest who did not get the chance to be employed are rest assured that the work would be done well and Ghanaians would feel safe.

Mr president if you really want to work towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, then you would give clearance to the Town and Country Planning Department to employ town planners who know and understand Planning and do not use unqualified protocol list to fill the vacancies and expect miracles to happen. For Ghana to experience miracles we must create it ourselves by putting the right people at the right places, going to work early and everyday, working to the best of our abilities and putting Ghana first above everything. Thank you.

Huzeima Mahamadu
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