Demolition at Nima…more rendered homeless

Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com

By William Yaw Owusu

Thursday September 9, 2010
About 35 people mostly women and children have been rendered homeless following a demolition exercise that was carried out at Nima, a suburb of Accra in the early hours of yesterday.

The exercise was in response to a court order sought by the owner of the land to take possession of that land situated very close to the old Mali Embassy and adjacent the Czech Republic Embassy on the Kanda highway.

As early as 6:30 am the area had been surrounded by about 50 police officers from the Greater Accra Regional Command to ensure that the demolition exercise which lasted for about 50 minutes was orderly with a bulldozer clearing everything at the site.

In an interview Ismaila Fuseini, a government appointee to the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) who was at the scene told Daily Guide that the demolition has nothing to do with the assembly as being speculated.

He said “the police officers have just told me that a court bailiff is here to ensure the court order is enforced and they are only here to ensure order.”

He said “some people are claiming that the land is going to be used for a toilet facility but I can say on authority that the AMA does not have any such plans”.

“My only concern is that the tenants are claiming that nobody informed them about the demolition. As it is over 30 people are going to be homeless. We are in the season of fasting and the owner of the land could have attached a human face to the exercise.”

Azindo Walker, 32, victim of the demolition said there were three different houses on the two-plots piece of land and claimed that at no point did anybody served them notice to quit the place.

“We were woken up this morning by the court bailiff and the police who said they were coming to demolish our houses. We could not even take our belongings before they started the exercise.”

Abdul Rafiu Adams, another victim said he once saw a notice which indicated that one of the houses was being offered for sale but added “we were never told the land was in dispute.”