Who Is In-Charge Of Koforidua Golden Jubilee Park?

The Golden Jubilee Park at Koforidua, build at the cost of hundreds of thousands of Ghana cedis of hard earn Ghanaian tax payer, had been left to the mercy of the weather and fast deteriorating with each passing day. The facility had been taken over by lunatics, weeds and stray animals. The Jubilee Park has become a perching place for people and amateur drivers use the grounds to learn driving every morning and evening. As a result of neglect, heavy cracks had developed all over the daises of the facility and its surroundings as well as the parade grounds are full of filth and weeds. The poor drainage system, when it rains flood the facility and part of the roofing had ripped off, thereby had destroyed the lighting system. Unfortunately, there is no security man guarding the facility and currently has about seven people residing in both the guests house which is detached from the park and the changing rooms. The people perching there have also made the facility their permanent abode and turned the backyard into farms. Crops planted on the background of the pack include maize, plantain and cassava among other are seen planted in commercial size. Meanwhile, in an interview with one of them by the Ghana News Agency (GNA) who would only give his name as Cudjoe, said they were permitted to reside on the Golden Jubilee Pack by the contractor who built the facility. However, Cudjoe could not identify who actually was the contractor when asked to do so. Cudjoe said he had been staying at the park for the past five years. The New Juaben Municipal Assembly, who is supposed to be managing the facility, revealed that, the Golden Jubilee Park had not been handed over to them and so could say nothing about it. To ascertain the truth, the GNA reporter further went to the Eastern Regional Coordinating Council (ERCC) to enquire if the Park was in their custody but the case was referred to the Regional Architectural Engineering Services Limited (AESL) since they are supposedly supervisors of government projects. Interestingly, AESL also said they had no knowledge and information about the construction of the Koforidua Golden Jubilee Park. The GNA reporter went back to the ERCC to see one Mr Godfred Nsiah, the Regional Engineer, who finally disclosed that, the facility was in RCC�s custody but were �yet to hand it over to the Municipal Assembly.� He said since he came into office about three years now, he had not been privy to the facility�s documents and that he did not know who the contractor and the consultant to the project were. �I am not aware that some people had converted the facility to their homes and farms�, he added. Mr Nsiah believed the contract might have been ordered directly from the �castle� following the little information he had gathered about the facility. He however did not know when but was sure the RCC definitely would one day hand over the Park to the New Juaben Municipal Assembly. The Koforidua Golden Jubilee Park is one of the Parks constructed in all regional capitals to mark Ghana�s 50th Anniversary in 2007. It was mainly to be used for national programmes and also among other things to raise revenue for the development of the region�s capital. However, as it stands now the Jubilee Park is not generating any revenue and nobody in the Eastern Region knows whether works on it are completed or not but currently looks abandoned and left to rot. A reporter�s investigation also reveals that the land on which the facility sits has no title deed.