Funsi (U/W), August 20, GNA - Alhaji Issahaque Salia, Upper West Regional Minister, says he would work harder to bring development to the new districts to encourage workers to accept postings to those areas.

He said due to the lack of electricity, district hospitals, inadequate office and residential accommodation, as well as other social amenities, some government workers were refusing posting to the Wa East District.

Alhaji Salia was addressing community members at Funsi as part of his familiarisation tour of the district to introduce himself to the people.

He gave the assurance that by September this year, Funsi, the district capital, would be provided with electricity to motivate workers to stay and work there, adding that cottage industries would also be promoted to enhance the livelihoods of the people.

Alhaji Salia said government would improve the road network in the district while efforts would be made to ensure the early completion of a Senior High School project which was under construction at Funsi.

An elder of the Funsi Community, Nalayakina Dumah, appealed to the government to provide the community with a dam and also improve social amenities in the area to help reduce youth migration.

He said the youth, including school children, had all migrated to some illegal mining areas in the country and leaving the aged alone in the community.

At a separate meeting with some assembly members, heads of decentralized departments and civil society organisations, Alhaji Salia appealed to them to remain loyal to the government and carry out its policies and programmes without any political bias.

He said government would appreciate their work if the services they rendered would help to improve the living conditions of the people.

Mr Aminu Salifu, Wa East District Chief Executive, said the district should be considered as one of the most deprived in the country because its capital had no electricity, which was affecting the normal functioning of government establishments.

He stated, however, that two communities, Goripie and Bulenga, had been provided with electricity while efforts were being made to extend the facility to other communities.

Mr Salifu bemoaned the poor nature of roads in the district and appealed to the Ghana Highway Authority and the Department of Feeder Roads to pay more attention to the rehabilitation of the old roads and the construction of new ones to open up the districts to the rest of the region and beyond.

Madam Dominica Dassah, District Director of Education, told Alhaji Salia that a Catholic Parish in Germany had for the past five years been waiting for the extension of electricity to Choggu to enable the organisation to build a Senior High/Technical School for the people.

She therefore urged the Regional Minister to facilitate the extension of electricity from Bulenga to the community for the project to begin.

Madam Dassah expressed regret that construction work on the Senior High School project at Funsi was slow and called on the contractors to be more serious on the project.

She said she was also not happy that the project had no layout plan and structures were being located indiscriminately without any regard for disaster and other environmental risk in future.