Adentan Assembly Rejects Aviation Report

NINE OUT of 13 assembly members who attended the emergency general meeting of the Adentan Municipal Assembly at the Assembly Hall on Thursday, January 9, 2014 voted in favour of the assembly passing a resolution to reject the Municipal Assembly�s Statutory Planning Committee�s report on the Adentan Redevelopment Planning Scheme. The members argued that the documents was fraught with conflicting, dates as well as forged signature, as the assembly at that time had no Municipal Chief Executive (MCE). They wondered how the assembly members could approve a report, which they knew little about and urged the General Assembly to submit a resolution to ask the Greater Accra Regional Minister, who according to law, is their MCE to oversee the activities of the Municipal Statutory Planning Committee till the confirmation of a substantive MCE. They added that the entire report must be re-evaluated, urging all relevant stakeholders within the municipality to make the needed inputs. The Presiding Member (PM) for the Assembly, Gladys Naadu Tetteh stressed that though the aviation land was not their property, they were mandated to sufficiently discuss the approval of any development. The Presiding Member stated that last Monday�s demolition exercise by the police and other security operatives at the aviation area, which resulted in the untimely death of Adjei Akpor, 28, who was described as a landguard, was unfortunate. The Municipal Town and Country Planning Officer, H.A.P Boham said the 632.67-acre aviation land was acquired in 1967 and it was the responsibility of Town and Country Planning Department to ensure that proper layout was carried out on fallow lands, among other things. Frank Tackie, the Director for Consortium, designers of the new Aviation Scheme, who addressed the assembly and was said to be the brain behind the demolishing exercise, said the brief he received from Cabinet indicated that all parties were aware of the exercise, adding that his outfit did not consider further consultation necessary. He stated that the Adentan site for the �Remote Receiving Station Redevelopment Planning� Scheme is an iconic central place that would transform Adentan. The scheme will involve the construction of 23 different projects made up of high rise buildings within a planned environment, which is expected to bring a lot of revenue to the assembly. The Member of Parliament (MP) for the Adentan Constituency, Emmanuel Nii Ashie Moore, said though the project was commendable, the details in the layout did not take the welfare of the residents into consideration. He said the assembly lacks adequate space for essential amenities such as hospitals, institutions of higher learning, befitting houses, among others, adding that this could have been considered in the new scheme. The MP categorically stressed that he was not against the project, but wanted to prevent a situation in which an aggrieved party would drag the assembly to court for negligence in future.