Ledzokuku: Unique, assertive voter population

The Ledzokuku Constituency in the Greater Accra Region is perhaps one of the constituencies with a unique and assertive voter population in the country.

Although known to usually favour presidential candidates of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), the constituency is particularly notable for electing new people as Members of Parliament (MP) in every election.

Since 1996, no MP has retained the seat even when the MP’s party is retained in power.

Due to a prolonged chieftaincy dispute within the area, the electorate — many of whom are indigenes of the cosmopolitan community — regard the sitting MP, rather than the municipal assembly, as their development leader expected to lobby for developmental projects.

The constituency, which has 12 electoral areas, is home to the Southern Command of the Ghana Armed Forces, the Kofi Annan International Peace Keeping Centre and a host of industries and malls.

The electoral areas are Tsuibleoo Central, Akromadeokpo, Akromadeokpo West, Nii Ashietey Akomfra, Tsuibleoo South, Okosekor, Sutsurunor, Teshie-Nungua North, Teshie-Nungua South, Agblezaa, Tsuibleoo North and Aborle.

The constituency boasts Teshie Presbyterian Senior High School (SHS), Teshie Technical Institute and the O’Reilly SHS as pre-tertiary schools, while the Southern Cluster of Schools, Northern Cluster of Schools, Anglican Primary, Roman Catholic School, Methodist School, Presbyterian Primary and the Da'salam Islamic schools provide basic and junior high education in the area and its neighbouring constituencies.

It is also famous for neighbourhoods such as the Teshie Nungua Estates, Martey Tsuru, Greda Estate, Teshie Camp 2, Manet, Tsuibleoo, Tebibiiano, and Lascala, among others.

Hitherto, the main economic activity in the constituency was fishing, but the springing up of some industrial concerns has changed the economic landscape of the area into a mixed bag of formal and informal work.

The LEKMA Hospital is the only government hospital providing health service to the people of Teshie and its nearby communities.

The Ledzokuku Municipal Assembly, which hosts the constituency, was established on November 1, 2017, under the Legislative Instrument 2319.

The front view of Teshie Presbyterian sHs

The area is bounded on the south by the Gulf of Guinea, to the east by the Krowor Municipal Assembly, on the north by the Adentan and the Ayawaso West Municipal assemblies, and to the west by La Dade-Kotopon Municipal Assembly.

Observations

Despite its recent economic and political importance, the constituency has become known for its poor state of roads.

While the Accra-Tema Beach Road reconstruction has advanced, residents complain that the slow pace of work in recent times has come with health implications as they continue to inhale and endure the dust.

Indeed, in May this year, the Concerned Youth of Teshie poured out onto the streets to protest the poor quality of roads in the constituency.

The group comprised keep fit clubs, driver unions, among other identifiable groups and individuals.

The roads in poor shape include the Tsuibleoo Road, Mobil to Tsuibleoo Last Stop, Bush Road, Adjorman Roundabout, Fertiliser Road and King Kotey Road.

Moments before the street protest, the Chief Executive of the Municipal Assembly, Mordecai Quarshie, announced the start of repair works and the laying of asphalt on some of the roads under construction in the constituency.

Apart from roads, the constituency has been experiencing flooding lately as evidenced on June 13 this year when a downpour caused disaster for many households in the community.

Many of the public schools in the area are also in a deplorable state.

Front view of the LEKMA Hospital

At the LEKMA Hospital, the main health centre in the constituency, the Administrator, Charles Banafo, said the hospital was mainly confronted with human resource and infrastructure deficits. 

Assemblyman

The Assembly Member for the Okosekor Electoral Area, Saint Kabu, said the construction of the Demo Road, which commenced in 2016, had been halted since the general election.

“The streetlights in the municipality are also not working, and this contributes to a lot of theft and robbery cases within the municipality,” he said.  

He added that the Demo footbridge, which connected the Okosekor Electoral Area to Nii Ashietey Akomfra, had also been left unattended to, stressing that it now posed a threat to commuters during the rainy season.

Floods

The Chief Executive Officer of the assembly, Mr Quarshie, said his outfit had commenced dredging works in the Sango Lagoon at Teshie to remove accumulated debris and sediment, and to broaden the lagoon to enable it to contain more water whenever it rained.

He said as part of efforts to check flooding in the area, the assembly had commenced efforts to demolish structures built on drains and watercourses, with the assembly set to demolish over 700 illegal structures built on watercourses.

The effort, he said, had come to a standstill due to litigations and interference by some authorities in the constituency.

Mordecai Quashie, LeKMA Municipal Chief Executive

He added that discussions were currently underway to begin the construction of the Demo footbridge, which started in 2022 but had stalled for several months.

“I am prepared to do anything for work to continue,” he said.

Roads

Mr Quarshie explained that many of the inner roads in the constituency got damaged when heavy-duty vehicles diverted traffic to those roads because of the construction of the beach road.

He said currently some major roads such as the Tsuibleoo Road, LEKMA to Adjorman roundabout, Fertiliser Road, King Kotey Road, Mamfe Junction to Yoomo Specs, the Numo Mashie Road and Mobile to Tsuibleoo Last Stop were being worked on.

He, however, gave an assurance that the government would consider other inner roads as part of the construction.

Mr Quarshie said gantries would be mounted at vantage points in the constituency to prevent the heavy-duty trucks from using the inner roads when they were eventually fixed.

Some inner roads at Teshie

Security

On streetlights and security in the constituency, Mr Quarshie said the main problem was with the quality of lights supplied to the municipal assembly.

Reacting to the rising spate of theft and armed robbery cases in the constituency, he said 30 years ago, the situation was not so due to mob attacks on suspected criminals.

He added that through various advocacy efforts, mob justice had faded but some criminals had capitalised on the soft side of the advocacy to commit crime.

Mr Quarshie said currently, the Municipal Security Committee and other stakeholders were in talks with the Regional Police Command to identify the hotspots to ensure the police paraded those areas at night.

On Education, he said, aside from donating furniture to public schools, the assembly had also painted the schools in the constituency.

Presently, he said, the assembly was working to provide solar-powered lighting in the classrooms to promote good eye care among the learners. 

Green Ghana

As part of government’s aggressive afforestation and reforestation agenda to restore the lost forest cover of the country, the municipal assembly has embarked on a massive drive to get rid of makeshift structures close to the roads in the community to pave the way for the planting of seedlings.

When completed, Mr Quarshie said, walls would be constructed to protect the green belts, which would be made available for the public to rent.

Revenue

Mr Quarshie noted that property rate alone could yield GH¢75 million a year to the municipal assembly, adding that notices covering GH¢75 million had been issued to property owners.

However, he said, the revenue collection platform set up by the Ghana Revenue Authority did not have many property owners enrolled on the platform, making it difficult for the assembly to collect the rates. 

MP

The MP for the area, Benjamin Nartey Ayiku, said since assuming office, he had embarked on projects in five sectors, namely health, infrastructure, education, agriculture and security.

In the area of health, he said in the first three months in office, he provided streetlights to the LEKMA Hospital in addition to other equipment for the mainstream administrative duties of the hospital, besides donating office equipment to the municipal health directorate to augment effective health service delivery in the municipality.

“I have also secured a parcel of land for the construction of a polyclinic within the constituency to expand access to quality health care for residents of the area and adjoining communities,” he said.

For infrastructure, the MP explained that footbridges had been constructed at the Tsuibleoo South Electoral Area (Muji Park), Akromadeokpo West Electoral Area, and Teshie-Nungua North Electoral Area to enable residents to access nearby communities.

He added that plans were advanced to provide similar footbridges in some other electoral areas.

To help mitigate floods in the flood-prone areas in the constituency, he mentioned that good drainage systems had been provided for the people of Yomo Specs, Okpoigonno and Rasta.

Contractors asphalting the road linking the Tsui Bieoo, Fertilizer and the LeKMA Hospital. Pictures: ESTHER ADJORKOR ADJEI

On education, Mr Ayiku said he distributed Mathematical sets to students who sat the mock Basic Education Certificate Examinations in 2021 and 2022.

He added that 4,000 exercise books had also been donated to the students.

Reacting to the rising crime issues in the constituency, Mr Ayiku said over 2,000 streetlights had been provided to electoral areas to brighten up the constituency to check the increasing crime rate at night. 

Sanitation                                                                                                                                                            

The MP noted that sanitation remained one of the major problems in the Greater Accra Region, adding that his constituency was not an exception.

To help tackle the problem, he said his office, with support from the Chinese Herbal Medicine Group, had provided 100 mobile places of convenience to address the sanitation challenges in the communities, adding that: “Apart from that, we have also financed the periodic clean-up exercises in the municipality”.

For employment, the MP disclosed that he had guided qualified youth to successfully apply to be recruited into the Fire Service, Armed Forces, Police Service and the Prisons Service.

Mr Ayiku added that his office had also provided start-up capital to some young women to start their own businesses and provided assistance to some artisans to start their trades.