Hajia Alima Mahama
THE LOCAL Government Workers’ Union (LGWU) has expressed worry over what it termed ‘unprovoked attacks’ on public servants at the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) across the country.
According to LGWU, such attacks had the potential of discouraging professionals from accepting postings to deprived areas.
Acting General Secretary of LGWU of the Trades Union of Ghana (TUC), Godfred Nyarko Okyere, raised the concern recently in a statement issued in Accra.
It follows recent attacks on the Chereponi District Coordinating Director, Alhaji Alhassan Fuseini.
The statement noted that “it is in this regard that the LGWU condemn in no uncertain terms the unprovoked attacks on MMDA staff with the recent one on the Chereponi District Coordinating Director and some officials of the Assembly in the North East Region.”
It recounted that “the incident occurred when the Coordinating Director, Fuseini was shot by some persons believed to belong to one ethnic group in the area and his vehicle set ablaze when he and the other officials were returning to Chereponi after attending a workshop in Tamale.”
The statement further noted that “there is a worrying trend these days, where public servants at the MMDA’s have become victims and suffered brutalities at the hands of factions to ethnic, chieftaincy and land disputes in some conflict prone communities across the country.”
It said “another development gaining currency in recent times is how political activists in their attempt to register their displeasure about some political appointees at the MMDAs decide to attack and vandalise properties of the Assemblies which sometimes lead to loss of lives.”
It urged “Ghanaians who engaged in unprovoked attacks on public servants at the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies to desist from such acts.”
The LGWU warned that “If we do not address these issues of “Perennial and sporadic conflicts which sometimes results in attacks on public servants, they will continue to discourage well-meaning Ghanaians to accept postings to serve in deprived communities. At a time that government is putting motivation package for public servants to serve in deprived areas of the country, sporadic outbreak of violence leading to the attacks on public servants is not healthy for national progress.
BY Melvin Tarlue