Reality Zone: Obuasi — The Johannesburg we have missed?
Obuasi in Ghana and Johannesburg in South Africa share one significant thing in common.
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They are both historical gold mining towns in Africa. Their rich histories are as good as gold.
Yet, while development on a massive scale has gone on in Johannesburg to make it an affluent city, Obuasi could be said to be a shadow of itself despite years of successful gold mining in the town.
Admittedly, Johannesburg has some of the worse slums on the African continent and as a visitor to the city, you should consider the slums a must-see. It is a sharp contrast to the scale of modernisation in the city itself. The peculiar history of South Africa is, no doubt, a factor.
But juxtapose the transformation of the “golden” city of South Africa to Ghana’s “golden” city, Obuasi. The difference is vast. Why has the shine eluded Obuasi?
I was in the Ashanti Region over the weekend for a funeral and so I made a visit to the historic town, Obuasi, just an hour’s drive from Kumasi, the regional capital.
Though not my first time to the mining town, the deprivation in the town was obvious this time compared to what one sees in Johannesburg, another mining city I had the opportunity to visit at least twice and transited through on another two occasions.
No doubt, Obuasi is expanding rapidly. Construction of both commercial and residential buildings, is on a massive scale. The scale of some of the construction works is very impressive and that exposes the level of prosperity in the town. Some of the lifestyles I noticed were traits of transformation. That is good.
The town is beautifully sited. As we drove around, I fell in love with the seeming valleys and hills with a bit of greenery in some parts of the town. Signage for sale of lands sited around did not surprise me. Obuasi is a potentially growing town.
There is some degree of affluence too. There are lots of vehicles of all sizes, shapes and makes on the streets of Obuasi. Taxis are scattered all over. On the Obuasi High Street, for example, we actually hit an unexplained traffic slow down, with the police in their splendid white uniforms controlling the flow of traffic.
The municipal assembly seems to have done a good job with the street-naming exercise supposedly going on in the country. The visible street names could not be missed. As for shops, they were uncountable and so were the banks and micro-finance schemes.
There are a variety of oil-marketing companies and well set up hairdressing and barber’s salons too. These, to me, are all marks of transformation in the people’s lives.
Obuasi has some beautiful small hotels. I actually tasted a week-end night out at one of the best restaurants in town. The beautifully decorated restaurant was half full on an early night with families, girlfriends and ‘boys-boys.’
I noticed some Chinese nationals around too with their Ghanaian affiliates. But, of course, customer service was highly lacking, with over-familiarisation exhibited by the waiters.
However, as I continued to compare the old mining town to Johannesburg, I felt some disappointment in Obuasi. The sprawling township gives away the fact that there have been years of no order in its planning.
We could have taken Obuasi as a model town and directed its development to make it a tourist attraction to tell our gold story. Have we lost the opportunity? Maybe not.
There are too many roads, even in the plush residential areas, which have been left to the mercy of erosion, with rocks sticking out.
There are too many non-asphalted roads for a town of its significance. Obuasi could do with many more street lights. The town is dark at night even though night life is relatively active.
Unlike some deprived mining towns in the country, Obuasi will always remain the town “under the rock”. The rocks of gold, as far as we know, are not exhausted yet for as long as AngloGold Ashanti remains.
That gives me hope that our town planners and local authorities still have room to re-model Obuasi to be an admirable town with attraction for tourists, domestic and foreign, to troop to. Let us not lose the shine of a golden opportunity to try and transform our gold city.
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