It has emerged that the
scores of youth, who took part in a demonstration over the poor state of the
road from Benchema Junction to Osei Kojokrom in the Juaboso District in the
Western North Region, were bused in NDC pickup vehicles from across the
district for the protest.
The demonstrators, mainly the
youth, blocked a portion of the road with some sticks and pieces of wood and
burnt car tyres in protest against the authorities concerned for doing nothing
to fix the roads.
Their action caused a
temporary halt to vehicular movement.
The protesters claimed
that there was a contractor working on the road but was asked to stop work by
the current government. They, therefore, appealed to the government to
immediately bring back the contractor on site.
They threatened that if
the road was not fixed within a month they would resort to smuggling their cocoa
beans to Cote d’Ivoire, indicating that the road was in a very dilapidated
state despite several promises from authorities and subsequent governments to
fix them.
“There was a contractor
who worked on the road for us but right now the whole road has been destroyed
again,” they claimed
Besides, they claimed that
it was unacceptable that a chunk of the country’s cocoa was produced in the
area but were lagging behind in terms of development. The youth felt sidelined
from the Ghanaian society.
Speaking to DAILY
GUIDE after the demonstration, a resident of the area who gave his name
as Master Maxwell insisted that the demonstrators were bused from some areas in
the district believed to be the stronghold of the NDC for the exercise.
He asserted that as early
as 7 am yesterday, the Juaboso Constituency Secretary of the NDC, one Alexander
Addo Kweise, started transporting them.
He mentioned that the
youth believed to be NDC supporters were transported in NDC pickup vehicles from communities like Nkatieso, Benchema,
Nkantakrom and ‘290’, all communities in the district for the protest.
DCE
Speaking to DAILY
GUIDE, the District Chief Executive (DCE) for
Juaboso, Madam Martha Kwayie Manu, indicated that she heard some youth embarked
on a demonstration in the area yesterday.
She, however, indicated that she was not aware the demonstrators were NDC youth saying it was the Unit Committee chairman for Juaboso who later informed her that those who demonstrated were NDC activists.
From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi
