Residents of Sumbrungu including the chiefs in the Bolgatanga Municipality of the Upper East region have advised the Aviation Minister to continue the abandoned airport project in Sumbrungu or face their wrath.
Their demand follows a proposal by the sector minister, recommending a new project site within the same municipality when she visited the region last week.
The Upper East regional airport project was started in the late 1980s spanning through several political administration and in the youth’s assessment it is about 60% complete, TV3’s Upper East regional correspondent Tanko Mohammed Rabiu reports.
Site plans were developed for the site in the early 1990s. The initial land size was 7,051.55 acres with 3.5 kilometers long runway.
On the 19th May 2017, the Minister of Aviation, Cecilia Dapaah in the company of officers from the Ghana Airport Company visited the region to assess aviation projects, importantly the regional airport project. The team also visited the proposed new site at Sirigu in the Bolgatanga municipality and Paga but did not visit the old site at Sumbrungu, incurring the displeasure of residents there.
On Monday, the chiefs, market women and the youth demonstrated climaxing it with a press conference to register their dissatisfaction about the intended relocation of the project.
According to the secretary of the group, Elias Ayinbila Apasiya, they suspect the Regional Minister Rockson Ayine Bukari is behind the relocation idea, which they said could potentially divide the two communities. The group said millions of Ghana cedis have already been invested into the project amidst the destruction of economic trees to make way for the project.
The secretary called on the Aviation Minister to reconsider her decision because she has been misled by Regional Minister.
A Chief Resource Guard at the Forestry Commission, Amitoriba Gabriel said the land area is a forest reserve and narrated how thousands of trees were destroyed during the start of the airport project at Sumbrungu. He is therefore calling on the minister not to relocate the current project because the new proposed site is also a forest reserve.
His position was supported the chief of Sumbrungu.
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