Kpando-Torkor residents threaten demo over poor road

Residents of Kpando-Torkor, a fishing and farming community in the Kpando Municipality of the Volta region have threatened to stage a demonstration over a poor 4 kilometers road that links the community to the Municipal capital, Kpando.

According to the residents, many efforts have been made in the past through the Municipal Assembly and other key stakeholders to construct the stretch but to no avail.

They also mentioned that the road was awarded in 2015 but the contractor left the site after the 2016 election, leaving the entire stretch in a deplorable state.

Youth spokesperson in the community, Hafiz Salifu told GhanaWeb that, nothing will stop them from staging the protest on Friday, 12 November 2021.

He said this is because "They have neglected us for so long, we planned doing this demonstration first but the former Municipal Chief Executive (MCE for Kpando) came and plead with us that we should give him two weeks and we did but almost two years now, we didn't hear anything again".

When the new MCE, Joe Badasu, who took office two weeks ago was contacted, he said, the Kpando-Torkor road and other deplorable roads in the municipality are in his heart because these communities over the years contributed to the development of the area.

Mr. Joe, despite being new in office, has already liaised with the Volta Regional Roads and Highways Authority to come to the aid of the people of Kpando-Torkor by sending the contractor back to the site.

He, however, urged the residents not to embark on the planned protest since he has already contacted the Highways Authority engineers to inspect the road.

"I will not encourage them to go on demonstration but if they insist, it's their right," he said.

The Acting Regional Director of the Roads and Highways Authority, Harold Atobra Agyeapong in an interview with GhanaWeb on why the constructor abandoned the road noted that "Due to some construction issues, the contractor has abandoned site. We've engaged the contractor on a phone call to come to site".

He added that "As a temporal measure, we'll quickly undertake some activities to make the road good and the assurance is that, within two weeks that temporal measure will be done whilst the constructor is mobilizing to come under the permanent work"

Kpando-Torkor is one of the developing fishing communities in the Volta region, the community which stretches along the Volta lake also serves as an entry point into the region from Eastern and Oti regions, the community also has a landing beach for ferries and a market.