The Golden Jubilee Park at Koforidua, built at a huge cost from the tax payer?s money, has been left to the mercy of the weather and is fast deteriorating with each passing day.
The facility has been taken over by lunatics, weeds and stray animals. The Park has also become a perching place for squatters, and amateur drivers use the grounds for driving rehearsals every morning and evening.
As a result of neglect, heavy cracks have developed all over the public gallery and the dais of the facility. Its surroundings as well as the parade grounds are weedy and full of filth.
Due to the poor drainage system, puddles of water flood the facility whenever it rains and part of the roofing has ripped off, thereby destroying the electrical system.
There is no security man guarding the facility, and as a result about seven squatters are residing in both the changing rooms and the guest house which is detached from the park. The squatters have made the facility their permanent abode and turned the backyard into farms. Crops planted include maize, plantain and cassava.
When the Ghana News Agency (GNA) spoke to one of the squatters who would only give his name as Cudjoe, he said they were permitted to reside at the Golden Jubilee Park by the contractor who built the facility. However, Cudjoe could not identify who actually was the contractor when asked to do so. According to Cudjoe, he and his fellow squatters had been staying at the park for the past five years.
The GNA also enquired from the New Juaben Municipal Assembly which is supposed to be managing the facility, and discovered that the Jubilee Park had not been handed over to the Assembly by the contractor.
Enquiries from the Eastern Regional Coordinating Council (ERCC) to ascertain whether the Park was in the custody of the RCC, were rather referred to the Regional office of the Architectural Engineering Services Limited (AESL) since they are supervisors of government projects.
Interestingly, AESL also said they had no knowledge and information about the construction of the Koforidua Jubilee Park. Here, the GNA?s line of enquiry also led to the revelation that the land on which the Park sits has no title deed.
The Regional Engineer at the RCC, Mr Godfred Nsiah whom the GNA reporter contacted disclosed that the facility was in the RCC?s custody but that they were ?yet to hand it over to the Municipal Assembly.?
He said since he came into office about three years ago, he had not been privy to the facility?s documents and that he did not know exactly who the contractor and the consultants to the project were. ?I am not aware that some people have converted the facility into homes and farms?, he added.
Mr Nsiah expressed the belief that the contract might have been awarded directly from the ?Castle? following the little information he had gathered about the facility. He, however, could not tell when it was awarded but was sure the RCC would eventually hand over the Park to the New Juaben Municipal Assembly.
The Koforidua Golden Jubilee Park is one of similar facilities constructed in all regional capitals to celebrate Ghana?s 50th Anniversary in 2007. It was also meant to be used for national programmes and to generate revenue for the development of the regional capital.
However, as it stands now the Jubilee Park is not generating any revenue and nobody in the Eastern Region knows whether work on the facility is completed or not. The only certainty about it is that it appears to be abandoned and left to rot. GNA
