The Hell of living at Adenta

Don’t be deceived by my headline, people. Adenta as a place is nowhere near the dreadful biblical hell, where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. No! It isn’t.
In fact, Adenta is one of the most serene vicinities in Accra. Located in the Eastern Part of the national capital, the sprawling community enjoys the tranquil breeze from the mountainous towns of Aburi, Larteh and other parts of Ghana’s Eastern Region.
Adenta on weekends is fun. For those of us who love to sleep on Saturdays, it’s refreshing to relax in a community devoid of the kind of disturbances and noisome partying experienced in communities like Dansoman, Osu, Korle-Gonno and other developed suburbs in the national capital.
The streets there are very well demarcated and the neighbourhoods, very serene. If you ever want to run from the pressures of Accra’s heat, visit a friend at Adenta on a weekend.
The local authorities have succeeded in building a relatively good market for families and patrons of household items and food stuff; I have also cited a beautiful plan for a shopping Mall Complex for inhabitants of the area.
So Adenta in itself is not a bad place to live at all, but the idea of living at Adenta, for me is absolute hell.
The thought of going back to Adenta after a tiring working day scares me to death; more frustrating is the idea if you don’t have a car.
Can you imagine - most people living in this community have to sacrifice at least one hour of their normal sleep just to dodge the extremely maddening traffic jam on the main Adenta-Accra road.
To get to the business centre of Accra by 7am, a commuter would have to leave his/her house at Adenta latest by 5: 15 am on a normal day and say, 4:30am on Mondays.
If you get to the main ‘tro-tro’ station at the old barrier at 6am, chances are that you would make it to Accra earliest by 9:15am. At that point your chance of getting a public transport depends solely on your strength and on your ability to struggle your way through to the measly seat of a 207 Benz Bus.
In the process, if you are unlucky, you end up staining your dress, crumpling your well ironed shirt or sometimes twisting your tie (if you are a man.), and of course the strategic presence of pick pockets who pose as passengers.
I tell you, Adenta ‘tro-tro’ station is probably the only lorry station in Ghana where passengers practically beg drivers to carry them in their vehicles for a fare higher than the normal.
So if you are a normal resident of Adenta, the first struggle you would have to go through on daily bases is the struggle of getting a ‘tro-tro’ seat to pin your ‘behind.’ (Do accept my language.)
If the exertion of your physical energy succeeds in getting you a seat in any of the rickety ‘tro-tro’ buses, be careful not to jubilate too much because the second battle has just begun – You must endure a minimum of two hours in an exasperating traffic jam before you get to 37 where you can enjoy a relatively smooth ride to Accra Central or Kwame Nkrumah Circle.
At times the gridlock becomes so frustrating one wish he could fly to his destination.
So before a normal Adenta resident gets to his or her work place, he/she has expended so much energy already that it takes the highest level of discipline to be productive at work.
Should you decide to escape the frustration of being in the sickening ‘Adenta traffic’, you must then pay the price of leaving home as early as 5am, but of course that comes with its own discomfort.
Leaving home at 5am means you must be awake by at least 4am. At that point, one is so conscious of making the 5am mark that there is hardly enough time for solitude, daily devotion and reflections.
The last time I sat in a public transport at 5am from Adenta, it was a pathetic sight. I boarded a Circle bound 207 vehicle at the former police barrier.
Ten minutes into the journey, after the driver’s mate had collected his transportation fares from the commuters; everybody practically bent their heads and as though it was a competition, they all fell asleep. From the driver’s mate to the last person at the back seat everybody sought to make up for the lost night sleep.
Of course I wasn’t left out in the ‘sleeping spree’. I had carried a new testament Bible to read in the moving vehicle but instead I ended up having ‘a new testament sleep’; occasionally knocking my head against that of the next passenger and embarrassingly whispering “sorry sir” – Oh Adenta wahala!
So you get to the office already tired but you must be productive and produce results for your company and to have a sense of fulfillment, so you can enjoy your monthly remuneration without any sense of guilt. (That is, if your conscience is alive.)
By 5pm when the working day is about ending, the last name one would want to hear is Adenta – the thought of queues at the lorry stations, the traffic, the bad road from Madina to the old barrier and the bodily pains to endure from the rickety ‘tro-tros’ is enough scare for any Adenta resident.
Some residents of other suburbs do stay in their offices and leave around 8pm with the intention of dodging the gridlock but it is not so with Adenta. For Adenta, even if you leave your office at 9pm, chances are that you’d have to endure the annoying traffic jam between the IPS junction and Atomic Junction.
Commuters can sometimes stand in queues at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle ‘tro-tro station for close to two hours or more just to get a vehicle back home – and then the traffic ‘wahala’ begins.
Right from Kwame Nkrumah Circle, through to Airport junction, Tetteh Quarshie Interchange, Legon, Atomic junction, Madina to Riss junction; Adenta traffic continues unabated.
So if you succeed in getting a vehicle by 7pm, after being in a queue for close to two hours, you are likely to get home earliest by 9pm or sometimes as late as 10: 15pm. Over two hours of infuriating traffic jam in a rickety public transport – If this is not hell, what is hell?
Oh! A word of caution, woe unto you if you get home and your water tank is empty. As for Adenta’s water problem, the least said about it, the better. Of course, now we are all used to it so GWCL and Acqua Vitens can choose to ignore us forever.
I need not say this but let me warn my Adenta folks: always make sure you have enough water in your tanks before you get home in the evenings, because if you commute in a public transport, you’d feel so weary in your body, a warm bath and possibly a massage from a dear one would be the best option.
So on the average, a normal Adenta resident expends an additional 30 percent or so of his or working energy commuting to and from work and the annoying thing is that this ‘wahala’ does not pay – It’s not funny.
THE WAY FORWARD
I think the best way forward to alleviating the plight of innocent residents of Adenta is for the government to work assiduously and complete the ongoing road projects.
I must commend the contractor working on the Madina/ Adenta road, I think the current pace is quiet impressive. Am not sure how the Riss Junction traffic jam would be dealt with but I believe the expansion of the Madina/Adenta road will go a long way to ease the gridlock between Adenta and the Tetteh Quarshie interchange. Between the interchange and 37, the experts must tell us how to ease the traffic congestion.
I believe Adenta’s current travelling predicaments provide an opportunity for Banks and other corporate institutions. It’s refreshing to see a few banks springing up in parts of the suburb. The last time I checked, I saw GCB, UBA and Prudential Bank situate their offices around the old barrier.
The presence of these banks is good, especially for Saturday banking. After a strenuous travel to and from work during the week, the last thing an Adenta resident would want to do is to sit in a vehicle for one hour just to cash money or shop in Accra.
I believe companies can take advantage of this and bring their product offerings to the people. There is still more room for the Zenith Banks, the Fidelitys and other financial institutions to draw closer to Adenta; the place is developing quick, and with the road construction almost completed, Adenta is surely set to position itself as one of the booming business centers in the capital.
Shopping Malls and supermarkets such as Melcom have a great space at Adenta and the earlier they take advantage of that the better. Internet Cafes are lacking in the communities and so are very good food joints for the bachelors. I hope some entrepreneurial minds are reading.
As for the water crisis, hmmmm…I think Uncle Atta needs to pay us a visit and ascertain the situation for himself – It keeps getting worse by the day.
Adenta our home - The beautiful ‘hell’ of Accra.

By: Sammy Osei

Contact – sammyosei@citifmonline.com