Member of Parliament for Ho West Emmanuel Kwasi Bedzrah has attributed wars and conflicts within the sub-region to boundaries that are not well demarcated, and used his constituency in Ghana that shares boundary with Togo as an example.
Mr Bedzrah who was contributing to a statement by the Lands and Natural Resources Minister to mark the fourteenth Africa Boarder Day also pointed out that there is a town in his constituency where citizens of both Ghana and Togo live together as one people. The only thing that divides the two towns is a boundary post and that still makes it difficult to know which side is Ghana and which side is Togo.
“I decided to build a school block there for them to learn English; half belongs to Togo and the other half to Ghana. The Ghana side people did not take it easy with me, they were of the view that I was taking over the land of Volta Akyem and Ashanti people”.
“They were thinking I was taking over the land completely. Even in the 2016 election, my opponent went to the town to create problem for me; when it comes to issue of elections it creates problem for us. At Haligba Togbe you cannot say this people belong to Ghana or Togo”, he emphasized.
Again, they have one chief who presides over both Ghana and Togo and our border demarcation should be done with this background at our mind that, if you have people at the border line deal with it carefully. There is one town at Agotime Ziope where the main road going to Akatsi North divides Ghana from Togo even that, he said.
More interesting is the fact that the Ghanaian electrical polls are cited in Togo land; you can buy food with either Ghana cedis or Togo CFA. These imaginary lines are creating problems for us in our sub-region. “The Minister and Boundary Commission should have a human face when it comes to the demarcation of our borders lines”.
According to the MP, “there is also another town called Hawluta, a border town; the immigration people were harassing my people in that community. They see them as Togolese, but they are Ghanaians. We should be careful that it does not get to election time and we start demarcating imaginary border towns, we will have problem with ourselves. We are all the same people, he cautioned.
Source: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ecowasnewsonline.com
