<<Print>>

Mr. Ambrose Dery, the Minister of the Interior, has urged citizens in the newly created regions to show tolerance and maturity in their reactions towards the selection of the regional capitals.

     He said the Salaga South violence, which arose after the selection of Damongo as capital for the Savannah Region on Tuesday, was unfortunate.

     Mr. Derry, therefore, appealed to all residents of the affected regions to consider the creation of the regions as a means to bring development to those areas, saying: “We can only have one capital at a time.”

     “Should you fail to get your choice, please we think that you should be law abiding”.

     “And if you think strongly about it, go through the due process and let us see what it is. Certainly taking the law into your own hands it's not going to be countenanced,” the Minister said.

    Speaking to the media on Wednesday on the sidelines of a signing of a Japanese Grant Aid to resource the Ghana Police Service in Accra, Mr. Dery said Ghanaians should rather applaud such developments even if some did not agree with the citing of a regional capital.

   “There is going to be one capital. But the President has made it clear that development will be evenly distributed and that it is not going to be a situation that everything will go into a capital city,” he said. 

    The Minister gave the assurance that the Police was ready to ensure security in areas where the capitals are being named and that the Police had been able to prevent other eruptions, especially in Gambaga.

     He, however, said the Salaga issue “was a little surprising because we thought that having announced the capital it should rather have been a time for celebration. Of course, the IGP is also working hard with his men and we hope that we would not have such reoccurrence.”