A Legal practitioner and Energy expert, Kwame Jantuah has chided the Information Minister, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah for using the phrase ‘from time to time’ in his press briefing on Sunday, 27th September, 2020 in Accra to address the Western Togoland impasse.
This comes on the back of information given by the Information Minister that members of the separatist group have been on the watchlist of the security agencies and were being monitored from time to time.
According to Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, the security agencies had prior intelligence and knowledge about the group’s planned attack on the Akosombo Dam and other sensitive installations and took steps to avert it.
However, the legal practitioner counters government’s action to salvage the situation in the Volta Region. Mr. Jantuah stated that instead of government focusing on safeguarding installations and infrastructure, government should rather focus its lens on protecting human lives.
“Can you imagine if they killed people? People’s relatives; mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers will be wailing at this point. If they blew up Adomi bridge, wouldn’t we find money to fix it? If they killed people on the road, will those people come back? So, the government’s responsibility is to protect human beings. Yes, it is good to protect installations but, when installations are concerned, we can fix it. Where deaths are concerned, you can’t bring the dead bodies back.”
According to Kwame Jantuah, folks in the Volta Region were interviewed, highlighting the major determinant of the secessionist crisis. He said that most of the highlights made, were on lack of development in the Volta Region.
Sharing in the grievances of the Volta Region, he intimated that the region has lacked infrastructural and economic development despite, their serene environment filled with nature’s aesthetics.
The leading member of the Conventional People’s Party, Kwame Jantuah, reiterated that what triggered the rise in the action of the secessionist groups is as a result of failure by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to develop the region, even when both political parties were handed the power to govern the nation.
“Unfortunately, the two political parties have not been able to develop the area. What I don’t understand with these two parties is that, even if you are not going to put industries and factories, the Volta Region is a huge tourist area. I have said that, if you compare what Holland has done with their waterways interspersed with land, a similar thing can be done in the Volta Region. Why isn’t it being done? What is it about the area that the both parties, one who claims is their strong hold, hasn’t done much in the area?”
Kwame Jantuah revealed that, “when we start the on-shore production of oil and gas, if we don’t do anything about our boarders, we are going to be in big trouble,” he opined.
He argued that instead of reiterating that the security agencies are trying their best, the security agencies and government should rather put in the hard work because, it is their job to be ahead of any unlegalized and unlawful actions in the country.
He urged the opposition party, NDC to desist from politicizing the threatening issue but, rather should put their hands on the wheel to quell the Western Togoland crisis.
