Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has chided the government for failing to undertake proper community sensitization in communities along the Tema-Mpakadan railway line ahead of Thursday’s test run which ended in a disaster.
The North Tongu MP is of the view that the accident could have been avoided if the government and the Railway Ministry had observed the necessary protocols prior to the day.
“As a community, we expected that they would have engaged us, there would have been community sensitization -we would all know that there is going to be this test run, we would all support and be involved to ensure that things like that incident do not occur; these are new railway lines which are not in use so the best would have been proper publicity to get the communities along in the known.”
“This is something we could have avoided. Imagine what would have happened if it wasn’t a truck but say a group of school children who were just playing, having fun and you know we were -and you know, all of us, we’ve been kids before you see a new railway line and you and your colleagues want to play around it, imagine what would have happened.”
Mr. Ablakwa believes the incident is a further highlight of the Akufo-Addo-led administration’s incompetencies and failure to get basic things right.
The North Tongu MP who was speaking on the sidelines of a party event in his constituency, registered his displeasure about earlier attempts to politicize the incident.
He said, “We are appalled that there have been attempts to link the owner of the truck to the NDC in North Tongu. This is a project that we are very proud of because it is the vision of our leader when he was in power. The Tema-Mpakadan railway project everybody knows started under His Excellency John Dramani Mahama, so why would we want to sabotage it?”
So far, the driver of the truck abandoned on the railway leading to the accident has been jailed for six months with four others remanded into police custody when they appeared in court on Monday.
Source: Ghana/Starrfm.com.gh/103.5fm/Faisel Abdul-Iddrisu
