Fear grips residents over siting of LPG station

Residents of Santa-Maria Last Stop in the Ga Central Municipality of the Greater Accra region are currently living in fear due to the 'dangerous' siting a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) station in the area.

The gas station, according to report, goes by the name Mambo LPG station.

The development, according to the residents, has the propensity to cause havoc which situation can lead to loss of lives and properties.

And with the June 3 GOIL Filling station explosion still fresh in the minds of many Ghanaians, the residents consequently called on agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) and the National Security to, as a matter of urgency, close down the station.

The immediate shutting down of the station, they noted, would go a long way to avert any disaster in the area.

They revealed that the Mambo LPG station has been built on the Lafa River near a refuse dump at Santa-Maria Last Stop, warning that any moderate rain could cause the Lafa River to overflow its bank.

What even made the situation dangerous was the fact that part of the river bank has been encroached by the Mambo LPG station.

That worrying situation, the residents said, is the cause of the perennial flooding in the area, anytime it rains.

Speaking in an interview with Today on Tuesday, June 16, 2015 some opinion leaders at Santa Maria who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity lamented that the “illegal” siting of fuel filling stations in residential areas was becoming a norm in the society.

They indicated that the filling stations seemed to be springing up more in those areas on the blind side of EPA.

They were of the firm opinion that the mushrooming of fuel filling stations in developing areas in Accra and Tema in particular demonstrated a clear case of institutional failure.

They recounted that in September 21, 2007 more than 130 people were injured in a gas explosion at the ENGAS filling station in Kumasi in the Ashanti region.

And after that explosion, they further recounted that the EPA officials quickly came out and claimed that ‘it was illegal to site gas plants and fuel filling stations in residential areas.”

They contended that the EPA at that time offered some palliatives to the affected persons and after that they went to sleep.

Investigations revealed that presently there are at least six fuel filling stations springing up between American House and Ashaley Botwe road, both suburbs of Accra.

These, this paper discovered, include Allied Oil, Goil, Top Oil, Sky Petroleum and two other ones which are under construction and all dotted along the East Legon-Ashaley Botwe road alone.

Today can further confirm that an Allied Oil filling station at Adjiringano in East Legon has been sited in the midst of many houses.

What even makes the situation worrying, Today observed, was the fact that the walls of the said gas stations were actually the fence of somebody’s house.

Earlier, some residents at East Legon whose houses are eclipsed by the Allied Oil Company told Today that when they realised that some developments were going on in the area, they complained to the necessary authorities but unfortunately nothing was done about the situation.

They claimed that the relevant regulatory institutions either failed in their duty or were complicit on their job.

“If the EPA officials had come here, there was no way they were going to give anybody a permit to site a filling station here – given that this particular one is so close to our homes, it just does not make sense,” the residents averred.

According to the aggrieved residents, it was clear that the EPA and the Town and Country Planning did the wrong thing by giving owners of the company a permit to site the filling station so close to their homes.

However, it was even more shocking for the Energy Commission to have allowed the company to start operating in the first place.