Land Guards Invade Weija (Back Page)

(Friday February 6, 2009)
LAND guards are reported to have resumed their activities of terror against property owners in and around Weija.
According to landowners in the area, they are being forced by land guards to abandon developing their properties or to part with various sums of money as digging fees.
The mode of operation of the land guards, according to some affected individuals, is that a group of land guards will demand a fee that range between GH¢100 and GH¢300 before the owners are allowed to carry on with their projects.
They said sometimes, after parting with the amount, another group would appear a few days later to make fresh demands, which must also be fulfilled.
The land guards, who residents say are mostly young men, are allegedly armed with all sorts of gadgets and move in groups ready to deal with anybody who attempt to disobey or challenge them.
According to some affected individuals, the land guards claim to operate on the orders of heads of factions that derive their authority from the Ashley and Sackey families of Weija. The factions, according to sources, emerged after the last Weija chief from the Sackey Family died few years ago.
The sources explained that in addition to the multiple fees being charged by the various groups, land guards within the Ashley Family had decided to revoke all previous agreements made during the reign of the former chief and were now demanding new fees from developers.
A number of plot owners who made separate calls to the Daily Graphic within the past week said they felt unsafe to go to the area let alone attempt to develop plots they had acquired and fully paid for.
One such caller told the Daily Graphic on Monday that workers she employed to erect a wall around her plot were chased out with guns, clubs and machetes and the structure was later demolished.
According to the woman, she was made to pay to one group earlier in the week but two days later, another group came and when the workers challenged them, the guards beat them up and chased them (the workers) away.
Another said he was a witness to an incident where a resident’s attempt to sink a manhole in a house he was already living in attracted the wrath of the land guards who demanded that he paid GH¢200.
After the man had reportedly pleaded to be allowed to pay GH¢50, the group collected it, went away and returned two days later to push the sand back into the pit, seized the working tools from the workers and went away with them.
Enquiries made by this paper revealed that seized tools were allegedly deposited at the office of one of the stool fathers (Dzaasetse), at an area called Upper Weija.
Another victim, one Charles, said workers he hired to work on his plot late last year were harassed till they decided to abandon the project, adding that when he tried to intervene, he was given death threats till he abandoned the project.
“My sister, I have decided to forget about the plot although I paid GH¢400 for it in 2004. My life is more important than any property on earth,” he stressed.
An elderly resident who said he had lived at Upper Weija for the past five years said the residents had to abandon their attempt to develop a spot into a lorry park. According to him, the land guards demanded fees from them and they told the guards it was a community project, but they persisted and the residents had to abandon the project.
When the Daily Graphic contacted the Weija Divisional Police Commander, DSP John Animpong, on telephone yesterday, he said he had not yet received any complaints on the activities of the land guards.
In other places in Accra, sources said more than 1,200 workers of the Customs, Excise and Preventive (CEPS), the Internal Revenue Services (IRS), the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), as well those of the Barclays Bank who acquired about 2,000 plots of land at Achiaman, a settlement near Amasaman in the Ga West District of the Greater Accra Region, were being forced by land guards to abandon the plots.