OBUASI RESIDENTS THREATEN JUBILEE HOUSE DEMO …Over Bad Roads

TRAFFIC FLOW at Obuasi, in the Ashanti region, was impeded greatly on Thursday as scores of angry-looking residents hit the streets to demonstrate.

The protestors were not happy about the appalling road network in the mining city and so they deserted their work just to showcase their anger in public.

The much-talked-about protest-march kick-started at the Tutuka Taxi Rank, early in the morning, and it ended at the Dunkwa Junction after some hours of walking.

The demonstrators, including even women and children, wore red armed bands to openly display their fury to the authorities concerned and government.

They also held placards with bold inscriptions, which suggested that the people of Obuasi have not been treated well by governments, both past and present.

Addressing the media, Frank Aboagye Denyansa, a leading member of the demonstrators, said businesses in Obuasi are collapsing due to bad roads, and threatened that the demonstration would be replicated at the Jubilee House in Accra if their concerns are not attended to by government.

“By the close of January next year, if the government fails to respond to our demonstration, we shall stage another one at the Jubilee House in Accra.

“Obuasi’s gold has been used to develop other areas in the country but our city has been neglected and this is a great injustice that we cannot bear any longer.

“Our businesses are collapsing now and we shall do everything possible in order to ensure that government fixes our bad roads once-and-for-all”, he stated.

Aboagye Denyansa said Obuasi roads had appeared in several budgets in the country as it happened recently, “but in the end our roads were not fixed”.

He stated that residents would put pressure on government to fix their bad roads in the coming year, saying “we also deserve better”.

FROM Akwasi Boakye

Kumasi