Pastor on bail for noise nuisance

Accra, Oct. 20, GNA - The Accra Metropolitan Sanitation Court, on Tuesday, granted a bail of GHc1,000 with one surety to Reverend Stephen Bafour Awuah of the Christ Apostolic Church (CAC) International, at Alajo, for noise making, in a residential area.

He was also charged for unauthorized citing of a church on a public lane, operating a church without an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) permit and a valid Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) license. Rev Awuah pleaded not guilty to all the three counts and the case was adjourned to November 2, 2010 for hearing.

Prosecuting, Miss Linda Kumbonu of the AMA Public Health Department, told the court, presided over by Mrs Janet Anima Marfo that, on September 28, this year, the noise nuisance taskforce visited the premises of the church at Alajo in the night and found the church members disturbing the residents in the area.

She said the taskforce measured the noise level to be as high as 92.4 decibel, far above the permissible level in a residential area, which is 48 decibel, as enshrined in the EPA guidelines at night. Miss Kumbonu said on the same day the team also detected that the church was wrongly cited, with part of its building on a public lane. She told the court that further investigation also revealed that the accused person has no valid documents from the AMA and EPA that authorized them to operate a church in a residential area. The prosecutor said in the circumstances therefore, the accused was served with summons to appear in court. 2