HELP TRANSFORM TWIN-CITY (PAGE 28)

The new Sekondi/Takoradi Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE), Mr Kobina Pra-Anan, has officially assumed work, with a call on the residents of the twin-city to get ready to be part of the transformation process in the metropolis.
He told the Daily Graphic that the metropolitan assembly would relocate occupants of buildings belonging to the assembly to make way for high-rise buildings to accommodate more people and offices.
He said present-day demands on the assembly required that available land must be properly utilised for the maximum benefit of residents.
The MCE said the Market Circle, which was built in the colonial era, would also give way to a modern market structure which would prohibit certain old fashioned trading practices.
He said special market days would be introduced at such centres as Apramdu, Sekondi, as well other satellite markets, to send the message across that there were other markets for traders to do business apart from the Takoradi Central Market.
Plans, he said, were far advanced for the construction of the model market and the assembly had been meeting with the architects to discuss them.
The MCE said one of the important things they were looking at was how to ensure that the project, when completed, would make room for greater demand on the facility for decades to come.
He said the Apramdu and Takoradi markets were going to be improved to make them more attractive to traders to ensure that they still continued their activities there, taking into consideration the time frame for the completion of the central market project.
Asked how the assembly would manage to get people off the assembly’s properties to give way for the high-rise buildings and get hawkers off the shoulders of the markets, he said the assembly would come up with resettlement packages for those who would be affected.
“The assembly has made some checks and these had shown clearly that the properties still belonged to the assembly. Through careful negotiations reason will prevail on both sides for the development of the metropolis to be carried out faster than expected,” he said.
Mr Pra-Anan said the focus of the assembly was to ensure that a perfect environment was created for residents, adding that moves by the assembly were neither to victimise anybody nor stop people from going about their economic activities.