On Creation Of Regions, Kofi Bentil Has A Point Only In Theory

In theory, I perfectly agree with Mr. Kofi Bentil, the Vice-President of the Accra-based IMANI-Africa policy think-tank, that the creation of more regions in the country will translate into “extra cost to the taxpayer” (See “Reconsider Creation of New Regions – IMANI to Government” CitiNewsRoom.com / Ghanaweb.com 5/30/18). Unfortunately, looking at the rigidly centralized manner in which politics and the distribution of our public resources were done for the greater period of the postcolonial era, about the best way to evenly spread out or equitably promote development in the country, is to healthily decentralize the process of governance to synch with that which was staunchly advocated by the likes of Drs. J. B. Danquah and K. A. Busia.

Indeed, as Nana Obiri-Boahen, the Deputy General-Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), recently pointed out at a forum organized on the subject, until the separation of the Brong-Ahafo Region, or the erstwhile Western Asante from the Asante Region Proper, the overwhelming bulk of development projects earmarked for this large administrative province was centered on Kumasi, the then-capital of both regions. The same can be observed of the Old Eastern Region, which also included the present-day Greater-Accra Region. As well, one can equally observe the relatively rapid development of Wa in the wake of the creation of the Upper-West and the splitting of the latter from the former Upper Region, whose administrative capital was Bolgatanga.

The elevation of Wa as a regional capital was a wise and progressive policy initiative on the part of then-Chairman Jerry John Rawlings and his Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC) junta, because it enabled the taxpayer’s money and the resources available to the erstwhile Upper-Region to be more evenly spread out to fairly benefit the citizens and residents of the western-half of the region, where in the past the overwhelming bulk of such resources was concentrated on Bolgatanga. In the Volta Region, with its administratively poorly located capital at Ho, or in Ho, to the extreme south of the region, the development of the northern part of the region has significantly lagged behind that of the southern-half, precisely because most of the development projects earmarked for the region by the central government tends to be concentrated on Ho, a predominantly Anlo-Ewe enclave, to the detriment of the non-Ewe parts of the region.

If we are to buy into the patently warped logic of Mr. Bentil, the IMANI-Africa Vice-President, the current situation of the warped targeting of development projects is more likely to create and promote ethnic conflicts, if not promptly corrected by salutary decentralization, as Ghanaians, in general, and the people of the Volta Region, in particular, become more acutely aware of such economic inequities. This is fundamentally why it has become necessary for the Akufo-Addo government to wisely accede to the demand for the creation of the Oti Region as a means of facilitating the rapid catching-up development of the northern-half of the Volta Region.

Of course, it cannot be gainsaid that the creation of too many regions is apt to engender a psychological temperament or mindset that may not necessarily work towards the organic unification of the country. But this aspect of the problem has more to do with responsible leadership and a sound educational system that inculcates in our youth a progressive sense of civic responsibility than anything else. As for the imperious and pontifical demand by the National Democratic Congress’ parliamentary minority for a detailed blueprint of the process for the creation of more regions in the country, such demand could not be more preposterous, for the simple reason that the Akufo-Addo-led government of the New Patriotic Party has been unprecedently transparent about the entire process and mechanism for the creation of the new regions.

If the Haruna Iddrisu Gang wants a detailed plan dealing with the proposed creation of the new regions, they know where to find or locate Mr. Daniel Botwe, the Minister of Regional Re-Organization and Development. Such demand, coming from the NDC operatives, is also ironic, to speak much less about the downright hypocritical, because had former President John Dramani Mahama clinched victory in the 2016 polls, one of his first orders of business, over which he had vigorously campaigned, copycat fashion, as usual, would have been the creation of new regions. It clearly appears that the Haruna Iddrisu Gang is not averse to the very idea of the creation new regions as such, but the fact that it is their archnemesis, to wit, President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who is leading such progressive policy initiative.

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