What interventions has govt provided for border communities? - Dzifa Gomashie asks

Member of Parliament(MP) for Ketu South constituency, Dzifa Abla Gomashie, has demanded of government to point out any social intervention government has provided for border communities like towns in her constituency since the closure of borders since March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The former Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture said this in an interview with Berla Mundi on the New Day show on TV3, Wednesday, May 12.

Ms. Gomashie was speaking on the heels of the dire economic impact on the livelihoods of residents and businesses in the border communities because of the closure of land and sea borders of the country last year due to the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic.

She said “initially they said it’s COVID but my gut feeling and what I have experienced here tells me that it was COVID and it is also about the election. One year, three months, from March 2020 till now, can government tell us that, having locked us out from Togo where they have said on many platforms that we have relatives in, what intervention can anybody tell me that has been put out for the benefit of the people because the borders were closed? Who can tell me what interventions have been sent here? Do you have any records of it as journalists? And don’t take my word for it only, if Nancy can come back to this constituency and go to the assembly and find out what was done, then talk to the people in Ketu South and find out what interventions they have received since the borders were closed, then we can have a continuous discussion of this matter.

“Look, on a daily basis you can count the number of vehicles from the lorry station, STC and then the main lorry station, that move from here to Accra, who are the people on the bus? Where are they going? Where did they come from? Yesterday I drove myself from Accra to Ketu South, I counted not less than 20 STC buses on the way. And if you go to the station right now, from morning to night, you will count the buses and from the language that is being spoken you can tell they are not indigenes of Ketu South. If you say that someone’s Ewe sounds like Togolese Ewe and so they are not Ghanaians if they are not speaking Ewe at all, then where are they coming from?”.

Ms. Gomashie further stated that “so people are doing their businesses but the local people whose livelihoods depend on where to sell okro or garden eggs or lettuce or cabbage because that is what we grow here cannot go and do their business. And the more we shout, the more we put cotton buds in our ears and don’t listen. I filed a statement to be read on the floor of parliament, I’m waiting for parliament to resume and I will be reading that statement. I will be asking that questions be answered to me and the people of Ketu South because this is really unfair.

“I mean, I’m very guarded when I’m speaking on national television but if I was speaking to you privately, the words I would have used would have been different. It’s inhumane to close the border knowing very well that even water, common water we fetch from Togo, so if you close the border, people have to pay someone so they can go and fetch water from Togo, so they can go and do marketing. And their market is closer to some communities in Ketu South than the Aflao market, than the Denu market or the Agbozume market”.