|
|
Sodom and Gomorrah, from political football to a good policy
decision
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Ghanadot
September 8, 2009
The cruel thing one can do to people living in squalid
conditions, like the environment at Sodom and Gomorrah, is to
allow them to stay there.
And that was exactly what happened some years back when the
attempt was made by the then NPP administration to relocate the
denizens of Sodom and Gomorrah and the attempt was frustrated.
Sadly, neither the Christian nor the Muslim Councils, that
recently have become very vocal about the state of politics in
Ghana, had a firm stand on the moral issue underpinning the
existence of Sodom and Gomorrah then. And for all we know are
still silent about that same issue now.
However, if the two councils did state their moral stand on the
issue in the past, and many God fearing citizens of Ghana
failed to hear that statement, we will love to have it stated
again: Are these councils for or against the NDC government's
announced intention to relocate the denizens of Sodom and
Gomorrah?
While we wait for the response, credit must be given to the NDC government for the decision to
remove Sodom and Gomorrah from the current
location.
At the same time, we need also to recognize the attempt made
some years back, by the
previous NPP government, to do the same. The wait between
government decisions has been long and this is cruel.
The first attempt by the NPP was thwarted. For political
reason or not, the relocation didn't happen based on a curious
reason of perceving "social justice." The NDC party had confused the real
lack of “social justice” in living within the squalid conditions
of Sodom and Gomorrah with the perceived hardship of the
relocation exercise; a need that sought to move or save the people from the
terrible plight that was Sodom and Gomorrah.
Still, years later, there is a lot to applaud
about the courage for the decision; about the NDC party which
once opposed the move,
and the same NDC now in government that supports the move.
The exercise will evict "more than 40,000
squatters there (Sodom and Gomorrah) without any form of
compensation or relocation as earlier envisaged,” and as reported by
the Daily Graphic.
The measure may be draconian. But, in reality, it is the
needed "social justice" that seeks to save the rest of the
citizens of the Accra Metropolitan area from
the hazards posed by the existence of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Compensation or not, "social justice" has been saved from
becoming a political football. People living in squalor
will not be allowed by government to live, regardless of that
social term.
So now, regardless of how much sympathy one may have for the poor, one
cannot wish Sodom and Gomorrah on them and call it "social
justice." The alternative is better because it protects the rest
of the country
from threats
linked to public health and other social vulnerabilities that
the slum represented.
Consider this:
The Greater Accra Regional Minister, Nii Armah Ashietey has
indicated that “squatters at the slum, who are sharply split
along a complex mixture of political, ethnic and chieftaincy
lines, also engage in illicit acquisition of small arms and
light weapons with which they engage in periodic clashes, often
with tragic consequences,” as reported by the Daily Graphic.
The Graphic also gives the history of the formation of Sodom and
Gomorrah as starting as a “shelter for some displaced
Northerners fleeing the Kokomba and the Nanumba war in the
1980s.”
The period and origin of Sodom and Gomorrah fell at a time when
Ghana was under a military government that used force to quell
all kinds of rebellion and dissent, except the same was not used
to stop the Kokomba’s and the Nanumbas.
Force could have been used to stop the formation of the slum.
But under the then revolution's crudely stated ideology of “we
not go sit make them cheat we” who could have had the nerve to
cheat the would-be denizens of Sodom and Gomorrah of their
“rightful” place of abode?
So the attempt to clear Sodom and Gomorrah in the early 2000s
was fought against by one Issah Iddid Abass and others who took the
AMA to the High Court to prevent eviction.
The plaintiffs based their right to stall eviction on the
grounds of “social and economic” justice provided for by the
1992 Constitution. They were defeated.
However, there was some honesty in their stance at court since
they readily conceded that they were squatters. What then to do
for squatters in such vile circumstances, except to move them?
But for some seven years, Sodom and Gomorrah stood because it
became a political dread until now.
The immediate removal of Sodom and Gomorrah has now been made
more necessary with the years because of the social, political, security
and the environmental problems that this “four acres” space
within the city of Accra has imposed on the whole country.
Then there is another angle that mostly has to do with the poor sanitation situation
prevailing in Sodom and Gomorrah and its impact on the Korle Lagoon
Ecological Restoration Project (KLERP)….
“The project, which started a little over a decade ago, has not
been able to achieve its objectives of restoring the lagoon to
its former state, where fish could be harvested, because it is
continuously filled with garbage, sawdust and human excreta;”
all on the account of our poor citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah.
The name KLERP may have originated “over a decade ago” as the
Graphic puts it. But substantively, the project dates back to
around 1965, when the Nkrumah government started dredging the
lagoon in an effort to turn the areas around it, the current
squatter’s heaven, into a place of business and leisure.
It is interesting to note that the concept for the lagoon
rehabilitation was conceived long before Baltimore’s Inner
Harbor in the USA was completed in the 70s by the Rouse Company,
with the same purpose as Nkrumah had in mind.
Sodom and Gomorrah owes its existence to wrong policy decisions.
It is now time to act to save its denizens and the citizens of
Accra from the senseless social acts and environmental ills that
the place generates. A removal by force is in order according to
the law and the moral imperative behind social justice.
The lack of compensation factor may raise a problem but in the
long run it may also have some social merit. Those who occupy
forbidden grounds should not be rewarded and allowed to profit.
They must not be allowed to profit from disrespect for disrespect the
rules of civilized society; namely, our society or what we wish
it to be.
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Publisher,
www.ghanadot.com ,
Washington, DC, September 8, 2009
Permission to publish: Please feel free to publish or reproduce,
with credits, unedited. If posted at a website, email a copy of
the web page to publisher@ghanadot.com . Or don't publish at
all.
|
