Hawkers unhappy with decongestion

Accra, Oct. 19, GNA - Hawkers at the New Tema Station, whose kiosks and structures were destroyed on Friday morning by the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) during the continuing exercise to decongest the city of unauthorized structures, have expressed their anger at the manner in which the exercise was conducted.

They claimed that the AMA did not give them enough notice before carrying out the exercise, thus making them lose huge sums of money. In an interview with the GNA, Madam Victoria Mensah, Chairman of Foodstuff Sellers Association, said the action of AMA had come to them as a surprise because when the Association heard rumours about the possible decongestion at the Tema Station, they contacted the authorities at the AMA and were assured that nothing like that would happen.

She said about two years ago, they were encouraged by the AMA to form the Association so that they could have a common voice in any decision of the AMA that might affect them.

She added that officials from the Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs and the AMA were present at the inauguration of the Association and they therefore felt that the city authorities had accepted them. Madam Victoria Mensah said the destruction of the market was painful because during the celebration of the 50th independence anniversary, they spent 35 million cedis to rehabilitate portions of the market and also put up new structures.

"Now that they have destroyed all these structures, this huge amount of money used to get the market beautified has gone to waste." She appealed to the AMA to either rescind its decision of evicting them from the Tema Station or find a place to resettle them as they had done for hawkers at Central Accra.

"We are prepared to invest more in the rehabilitation of the market if the AMA is not happy with what we have done so far. They should please not throw us out of business since we also have families to take care of," she said.

Madam Evelyn Amoako, a sachet water distributor whose kiosk was destroyed, accused the AMA of carrying away her deep freezers. The decongestion exercise has also affected areas such as Circle, Makola, Kaneshie and Tudu.

AMA on Wednesday night gave some bite to its vow to decongest the metropolis when it again embarked on a massive exercise to rid the city of unauthorised structures.

The city authorities have also vowed to sustain the exercise until people see reason.