A second national capital is needless – K B Asante

Retired Diplomat and Statesman K.B. Asante has described as “unnecessary”, considerations for a second capital city for Ghana.

“It's not necessary”, K. B. Asante told Radio XYZ’s news magazine programme Strict Proof on Monday.

He said rather than have a second capital which is likely to get bedeviled with the same problems as Accra, innovative ways must be fashioned out to deal with the issue of population growth and congestion.

Reports by the Independent Newspaper suggest the Ashanti Regional capital, Kumasi, is highly tipped to be the second capital.

The current national capital, Accra, if the recommendation goes through, will remain the political capital while Kumasi becomes the economic capital just as pertains in some neighbouring African countries such as Nigeria and Ivory Coast.

The need for two capitals is one of the many recommendations presented to the president by the Constitutional Review Implementation Committee (CRIC).

In the recent past, there have been suggestions for the capital city to be moved to Dodowa in the Eastern region, as part of measures to rein in the bloating city, which is currently bursting at its seams.

That would have been the second time, had that been implemented, that Ghana’s national capital would have been moved.

The first of such movement was about 130 years ago when the capital was moved from Cape Coast of the then Gold Coast to Accra.